


In Celebration (25+5)

by LazyWriterGirl



Category: Fire Emblem: Kakusei | Fire Emblem: Awakening
Genre: 1000 Words Each More Like Never Again, Angst, Canon Compliant, Chapter Twenty is the Most Risque Thing I've Ever Posted And It Isn't Even Close to Risque, F/F, Fluff, Future Past! AU, Most Couples One Could Think Up For This Cast Are Cute, Please Excuse My Obvious Bias, Rarepairs Abound, Sometimes People Die, Sometimes They Don't
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-01
Updated: 2017-01-20
Packaged: 2018-09-13 14:48:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 30
Words: 30,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9128692
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LazyWriterGirl/pseuds/LazyWriterGirl
Summary: A collection of ficlets celebrating Fire Emblem Awakening femslash pairings (and one very special birthday)! Alternate title: Fire Emblem Lesbians





	1. Aphrodisiac - Tharja x Cordelia (Part One)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [WindStainedDreams](https://archiveofourown.org/users/WindStainedDreams/gifts).



> I don't own Fire Emblem Awakening and make no money off of writing this work. All errors are mine. Hope that you enjoy this work, and Tin, if you're reading this, happiest of days to you (even if it isn't your birthday at the moment!)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tharja is attracted to power, and Cordelia is a powerful woman.

 “Good morning, Tharja,” she says, tossing back a lock of hair from her face. Deep red mixes in with the inky blue of her sleeves, and Cordelia feels strange. These robes…she does not know that she will ever come to feel as if they are hers. She cannot imagine standing in them as comfortably as Tharja does.

As beautifully as Tharja does.

Shrewd eyes scan the scuffed pages of the tome in Cordelia’s hands as Tharja scoffs, “I still do not understand why you practice with Flux, when you are so much more powerful than that.” The drawl of Tharja’s voice is more comforting now than it had been when they first began their work together. “You are no stranger to magic, _Cordelia_.”

 

No, she wants to say, what she _is_ a stranger to is the tingle—of fear, or excitement, or arousal (she is not certain which)—that crawls up her spine when her name falls from Tharja’s lips.

 

Cordelia coughs demurely into the crook of her elbow before answering, “We have precious few resources at our disposal. Robin and I thought it well enough that I learn the basics through use of the most basic of tomes.”

The change in Tharja’s demeanour at the very mention of Robin is as astounding now as it has always been. Tharja loves Robin to the exclusion of all others, it seems, and though she knows that she is beautiful and brilliant and _powerful_ —and though she suspects that Tharja _appreciates_ these things in some capacity outside of what is professionally acceptable—Cordelia is no Robin.

 

“We shall begin,” Tharja says, as abrupt as always.

As charmingly blunt as always.

Cordelia opens her tome and prepares to summon the magic to her fingertips, the way she has done so many times before. She feels it underneath her skin, her power, coursing even deeper within her than her blood. It will rise to answer her call; it will obey her. Still she waits, eyeing Tharja carefully, watching for a sign.

Tharja looks at her, and Cordelia feels foolish now. She is only playing at sorcery, in Tharja’s eyes, surely; surely the dark-haired woman is offended at how little Cordelia knows about her—their—craft. Surely she is only here because Robin has asked her to be. The thought remains with her even at the slight inclination of Tharja’s head.

 

Cordelia’s grip tightens around her tome.

 

She is able to cast Flux almost every time and Tharja, though her expression barely changes, is impressed. There is no way to misinterpret the pleased curl of Tharja’s lip as she watches Cordelia’s spells rend the air asunder on their way to the target. There is no other way to read the manner in which Tharja’s eyes sweep over the novice-sorceress before her as Cordelia breathes in deeply, still not quite used to the toll that the dark magic takes on her strength. Appraising. Approving. Ardent—though perhaps that last is not more than a wish; the result of her heart’s pining. Not real.

Tharja had once mentioned power to be the aphrodisiac upon which she based most of her attractions, and to think that she has _pleased_ the broody woman in some way does marvels for Cordelia’s self-confidence—a finding that startles her less and less each time it becomes apparent.

 “Here,” Tharja says, and Cordelia finds herself staring down at the shorter woman with something akin to disbelief on her face. It is not just Tharja’s sudden closeness that surprises her. Tharja is offering her one of her own tomes; Ruin.

Cordelia shivers. “I couldn’t possibly.”

Tharja laughs, the sound echoing in Cordelia’s ears. Darkly, but oh-so temptingly. “Do not fear using it once or twice, Cordelia. With your luck, it shall not see much wear from a few minutes in your hands.”

Cordelia flushes, remembering the months she had spent as a mercenary by Robin’s request—those days had been hard, but she had learned her way around a weapon, among other things; had learned how to make the most of a sword that others would not have picked up for fear of it breaking.

She does not know what it is that prompts her to take the tome from Tharja’s waiting hand, but she does. When Tharja does not back away from her, she tilts her head downwards, askance. “Tharja?”

“There will be times when you and a partner are this close, if not closer,” Tharja says, leaning up and into Cordelia’s space. “Of course, your partner will most likely not be a fellow sorceress…” Tharja’s voice rasps against her ear. “Nevertheless…it would do you well to practice your magic in such close quarters. Go on.”

“I cannot control…you may be hit wi—

“I am aware of the radial effects of dark magic,” Tharja says, and her thick laughter is so, _so_ appealing that Cordelia almost drops the tome in her hands. “I find it rather…alluring. Don’t you?” At the lilt of encouragement in Tharja’s voice, Cordelia only needs to skim the pages before the Ruin spell is soaring from her outstretched hand and into the air; striking its mark with such force that it completely. Destroys. The target.

 

She is about to recoil from herself, about to apologize for such blatant misuse of her power when they are only training, when Tharja’s hand strokes the length of her arm, and the pale woman shivers into her side. The stroking hand drops to Cordelia’s hip, and stays there, digging firmly enough into flesh that the woman’s intentions _cannot_ be read as anything other than what they are.

An invitation.

“Excellent, Cordelia.” Tharja says, and her voice is so close in Cordelia’s ear that she would use—would _abuse_ —her gifts over and over again just to have this experience at every turn. “You’ve become so _powerful_ in so short a time.”

 

And Cordelia, knowing just what power means to the woman at her side, can only smile in response.


	2. Breath - F!Robin x Olivia

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As a dancer, Olivia understands the importance of breathing. As a woman, she understands it all the better.

Robin has taken to watching her dances from slightly outside the shadows—slightly _inside_ the light—but Olivia has grown accustomed to the weight of the tactician’s gaze. Her step does not falter. Her arms do not stiffen like the limbs of deadened trees. Her breath does not catch in her throat as she twirls.

Though if it—her breath—does catch at the sight of Robin standing there, smiling in her direction, well…that cannot be helped.

“Olivia,” says the tactician when the dancer has finished her routine. “I wanted a word with you, if you have the breath to spare.” The woman’s lips quirk upwards in the way they usually do when Robin is making a jest.

Olivia’s first and only reaction is to laugh.

Breathlessly.

“Of course, Robin,” she says once her laughter has ceased, and for a moment she wonders when it was that she started being able to speak to the tactician without stuttering. She decides, as she wipes at her brow with a handkerchief—the last of her clean ones, she notes—that it does not matter. The point of the matter is that she trusts Robin, and that is enough to satisfy her as she stretches.

She chases the warmth of motion into every extremity, waiting for Robin’s words.

“Chrom and I found another of those blue seals lining the pockets of a…rather unfortunate bandit. In light of that, I wanted to ask you…if you’ve ever considered taking up lance and tome?”

Olivia pauses mid-stretch, peering between her fingers, eyes catching on the glimmer of gold that adorns her right ring-finger. That part of her, at least, with its connection to her heart…that part at least, is always warm.

“Olivia?”

“I hadn’t thought of it, no,” she manages to say. Robin does not look as if she believes that, and she would be right not to. Ever since the discovery of the blue seals (and their gold counterparts) Olivia _has_ thought about it, yes. Thought about moving away from the dancer’s life, of moving up into the ranks of the army as a viable soldier, of being _worth_ more for…for her own sake …but she only thought about these things in passing, yes; here with one breath, gone with the next. “I haven’t thought of it _much_.”

Robin seems to be more pleased with this revision, though not by very much. “Why not?”

There are a plethora of reasons, and she has gone through each of them time and time again, but the only one that she can think to present to Robin now is amongst the weakest of them. “You know that I have only ever fought with a sword and nothing else.”

“As well as I know that you are a quick learner.”

A hum of agreement finds its way into her throat, and Olivia knows that she cannot stop it from reaching the tactician’s ears. To her surprise Robin says nothing, only watches her as she shakes the final remnants of tension from her limbs. When it is apparent that she has finished, Olivia turns her eyes to Robin’s. “You found another of those scrolls as well, did you?” Robin’s breathing hitches, and the dancer smiles. “That’s wonderful.”

The tactician speaks after a beat, voice softer than the whispers carried on the passing breeze. “Would you consider it now?”

“Would I have time to learn from instruction, first?”

“Of course,” is the immediate reply; Robin smiles at her. “Anybody in mind?”

Olivia feels a smile grace her own lips, and she draws closer to Robin, still a respectable distance away. She does not much care for propriety, but things are different now that the Exalt has a baby girl and his constant companion, the Grandmaster of Ylisse, is yet unmarried in the eyes of Ylissean law. Though the majority of gossips would not care to talk about small improprieties while on the campaign trail, there will always be those who remain leery of the relationship between Ylisse’s Plegian tactician, and a dancer of unknown—though presumably Feroxi—origin.

Ridding herself of thoughts of such petty intrigues, Olivia allows herself to breathe, and takes one more step into Robin’s space. The atmosphere between them changes from tensely professional to tensely amiable, a familiar enough space for a dancer of Olivia’s talents. “I was hoping that you would be able to help.”

Robin laughs gently, the warmth of her breath a familiar comfort. “I will do my very best. With the tomes, most specifically. As for your lance-work…”

“You won’t teach me?” Olivia does her best to mask her disappointment, stifles a sharp intake of breath, and waits.

Robin places a hand on her arm, takes another step into Olivia’s space. Their breath meets in the chill of the air around them, smoke mingling together before disappearing into nothing. “I only wish for you to learn from the best…it is my _duty_ to make sure that you are taken care of properly. That you are given the best of everything. And Cordelia has agreed to—

“Cordelia,” Olivia begins, catching Robin’s hand with her own before continuing, “is one of the finest masters of the lance to ever have lived…but if this is your duty, then please. Be the one to teach me. I would like it to be you.”

“Is that an order?” asks Robin, and the humour in her voice is not lost on Olivia.

“A request,” she corrects.

Robin laughs outright, leaning down towards where Olivia’s lips wait for hers. Breath mingles—shared from the source—and the dancer’s hand seeks out the place where she knows Robin’s ring (on her right ring-finger) rests.

The same place where it has rested since the day Olivia placed it there.

The same place where it rests only weeks later, familiar comfort for Olivia as she balances on her new mount, Robin seated snugly behind her as the chill mountain air knocks the breath from their lungs.


	3. Caress - Tharja x Cordelia (Part Two)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Once, she thought the colours to be the only way to remember the world and now, thanks to Cordelia, Tharja is learning otherwise.

When she was a little girl, a very little girl, the world was mostly a sea of yellows and golds and blues that seemed at once too distant and too close. That stopped, however, when her mother discovered her raw talent for magic—and more specifically, for the dark arts. Though (from that point on) much of her childhood had been spent in the deep browns and purples and blacks of her mother’s cellar, Tharja remembers one thing more—Tharja remembers the colour red.

 

Red like the sun setting over the rolling Plegian sands.

Red like the apples that her father would sneak to her on market days.

Red like the blood that she had so often watched trickle slowly into ritual bowls.

 

Where only months ago she would have claimed that last to be her favourite, now there is another shade of red that she favours over all. Red like lust (or something stronger and more real), the same as the red that touches her cheek as Cordelia hovers slightly over her. The red that bursts from behind her closed eyelids when Cordelia’s focus travels lower, lower, _lower_ and Tharja allows herself to unravel.

 

Tharja knows that this is something stronger (something more real) when the morning comes and the red of Cordelia’s hair is still her favourite red.

 

Cordelia’s voice whispering her name…it is quickly becoming a favourite of hers, as well. “Tharja, you focus so much on the colours. Why?”

Tharja does not know how to explain that, when the question is put to her. How _does_ one explain that for a while, the colours were all that she really had aside from her parents scarce words and the thrill of dark magic at her fingertips? As a child, she had always had the colour before words, though she had been able to hear and understand the names when her mother had deigned to speak of them—her mother had never really liked to speak, least of all about things outside of the practice of her arts, and Tharja…well, Tharja fears that she has become the same.

She does not know how to explain that where power has always driven her towards everything—towards weapons, towards professions, towards people ( _lovers_ )— _colour_ has always been her way of holding on.

 

Of making—and keeping—memories.

 

She thinks, as she allows Cordelia’s sentimentality to wrap her up in arms both smooth and strong, that perhaps she focuses so strongly on the colours because they, unlike words, have never failed her at times like this. To her surprise Cordelia does not pry. Instead, the taller woman—and why is she so tall even when they are lying here together on Tharja’s cot—only pulls back (but slightly) and traces a fingertip down Tharja’s cheek, following the pathway down to Tharja’s jaw, to Tharja’s chin. Cordelia’s touch is gentle, almost reverent, and Tharja, as she has begun to do on instinct where Cordelia is concerned, sighs into the caress.

Touch—she could quickly become addicted to it, she thinks.

“Tharja,” Cordelia murmurs again, and Tharja offers a whisper of her lover’s name in reply. The single utterance does not seem to suit the redhead’s current mood, and so Tharja repeats it until Cordelia is smiling against her neck. She repeats it even as Cordelia rolls over her on the cot, even as Cordelia’s hip falls to sit flush against her own, and repeats it still when Cordelia shudders against the motion of her hands. Her own name fills what little space remains between their bodies, tumbling from Cordelia’s mouth with such passion that Tharja is almost startled.

She does not know if she can ever be as gentle with her touches as Cordelia is with hers, but she does know this—that touching Cordelia like this, with their bodies falling into each other so completely—is fulfilling in a way that makes her think that she does not _need_ to hold on to the colours so much.

Tharja is not a romantic woman in any classical sense of the world, but she does not think that it will matter; for Cordelia’s sake, she’s willing to try.

 

 

 

 

It is as if in thinking it, she has allowed it to be done, and Tharja begins to see the world as _more_ than just blues and golds and blacks and reds and colours, colours, colours.

 

She begins to understand, with Cordelia’s help. There is more to the world than the colours. Tharja has always known this, of course, but it is difficult to focus on everything else after nearly two decades of focusing on _nothing_ else. If it were not for the woman at her side—the woman who blocks out all the rest of the world so that all Tharja can see in her presence is flaming red—Tharja is not sure she would have ever thought such a shift in focus were necessary.

Tharja follows orders when they are on the move, lets herself fall into the natural pace of the army. Tharja marches, and when Cordelia is asked to sit astride a mount once more—an alicorn with platinum mane and a coat that’s gold-tinged-white—Tharja rides behind her lover, taking in not just the colours around them from their place in the air, but the sights in general, and the sounds of the world surrounding them, and the feeling of the wind in her hair and her arms wrapped around Cordelia’s waist. The taste of ash in her mouth as they approach the top of the Demon’s Ingle. Her memories—from the past, from her life _before_ —are lacklustre in comparison to those that she is making right now, and she can tell that Cordelia is proud of her from the way that the falcon knight smiles.

 

 

 

The redhead speaks her pride in their tent, late at night, and the sweet words are accompanied by the sweeter caress of Cordelia’s fingers over Tharja’s skin.

 

 

 

Tharja...might love her.


	4. Daggers - Anna x Miriel

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Anna knows this isn't the most honest way to go about it, but one way or another all she wants is a little more time with the woman she loves.

She wants Miriel's help in rearranging the daggers in her display case.

Of course, being Anna, she can’t just up and explain to Miriel why it is that she wants her to spend time at the shop, away from her lab or her library. It would take away from her mysterious appeal. Instead, she says nothing, but of _course_ Miriel’s sharp mind is already questioning why she’s here.

“While I admit that I can see the necessity for assistants in your line of business I must confess that I am unaware as to what _I_ could possibly be doing assisting you when my academic pursuits have not prepared me for labours of a commercial nature.”

Anna looks up from her ledger with what she hopes is a fond smile. “Take a breath, Miri.” She flicks hair back from her forehead and winks, as winningly as she can. That should do something to impress her decidedly unimpressed companion.

It does nothing of the sort. At least, it does not _seem_ to do anything. Instead what Anna gets is the sight of her “assistant’s” slight scowl as she fidgets with her spectacles for a second, which turns into quite a few seconds. Quite a few seconds of _not doing anything to further the day’s profit_ …but Anna stops herself. This is what Robin had been talking about. She needs to stop thinking about money so much— _ha!—_ about profit so much; especially when matters of the heart should be her focal point.

“Yes, hmm, Anna, I believe we discussed this prior to my coming here today—as we discuss it _almost every evening at home_ —but my proper name is _Miriel_.”

“I know that, Miri…but I like feeling like I’m the only one who gets to call you that.”

“Oh? And why is that?” Miriel quirks an eyebrow and Anna thinks of what lovely sharp lines the fine hairs make.

“Because I like being the only one who gets to love you enough to call you pet names, of course.” She hopes that if she says it matter-of-factly enough, if she turns her attention to her ledger again and tries to pass it off as a simple thing, that Miriel won’t see how she’s blushing slightly. Not that Miriel would comment—though she might make some sort of noise about the shop requiring an open door due to high internal temperature.

What Anna gets instead is a quick peck on the cheek and a small smile. “I see,” Miriel says, and when Anna looks up there is the faintest dusting of pink on the scholar’s freckled cheeks. “Unfortunately, with a name as succinct as yours I would not be able to craft a suitable moniker to act as counterpart…unless Anna is the shortened form for another name, in which case I might then use your full name as a means of distinguishing myself from those with whom you are _not_ in a romantic relationship?”

Anna laughs. She finds that ever since this _thing_ between herself and the bespectacled mage-scientist began she’s been doing quite a bit of that. But not the sort of laughter that accompanies a well-formed pun or a successful con—sale, she reminds herself. Not the sharp, almost scary sound she’d grown up hearing from mothers and sisters and cousins and aunts.

 

It’s more like the sort of laughter that surrounds the Exalt and his wife wherever they go.

 

Fond laughter that comes up because a loved one is endearing, and not because one is laughing at a loved one’s expense…in any sense of the word.

 

“Anna, while I am glad that I have amused you, I do believe that I asked you if you could explain why it is that you’ve decided that I would be the most suitable to assist you when I have many a project to attend to which would…” Miriel trails off, and Anna rearranges her face—she’d been staring. “Is there something on my countenance that has so fascinated you that you have foregone the polite customs of society in order to gaze upon me so intently?”

Miriel’s words are sharp, but not rudely meant, and Anna cannot help but applaud herself for what she has planned. In this current peaceful time, it might seem a little nonsensical, but it’s an ironically fitting task, and one that the woman certainly could not accomplish anywhere else outside of Anna’s own shop. It’s also a rather time-consuming task…but Anna spends late nights waiting up by Miriel’s door and so surely, just this once, Miriel can spend a late night here with her.

 

“I wanted you to help me sort the daggers in the display case,” she says, and it comes out strangely meek. Not at all the way an Anna should speak.

Miriel’s surprise is…unsurprising, really.

“Surely you are not still thinking that such wares could turn a profit? We have been peaceful in Ylisstol for a year’s time now, and even the roaming bandits have tapered off into far more manageable numbers.”

“You never know,” Anna supplies, shrugging as nonchalantly as she can, “And besides, even if nobody buys them, I think that they should at least be _organized_ , you know? And you’re so well-organized and I miss having you ar—”

Miriel smiles and Anna knows that she has been caught. “Anna, if you wanted to spend more time together, you need only have said so.”

“And what makes you say…?” Anna trails off, knowing from the way that Miriel’s eyebrow lifts that lying would be futile. “Alright, you’ve caught me. Miri, you’re too sharp.”

Miriel’s eyebrow lifts even higher and she lets out a quick laugh. “Daggers and puns about sharpness…you are a strange one indeed, Anna.”

Anna laughs too. “But you love me, right?”

“Yes, I suppose that such a phrase would be accurate to describe the affection I feel for you.”

“Miri…”

“Yes, Anna, I love you. Now, where might I find that display case?”


	5. Enmity - Say'ri x Aversa

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It is shameful, and that is why nobody else knows exactly how well Say'ri has come to know the enemy.

Say’ri has her own reasons for distrusting Aversa. Because of her, good men and women have died. Good men and women who had meant something to Say’ri's comrades—and, more recently, good men and women who have come to mean something to her. And it stings all the more, because once, even though it had been for but a brief time, Aversa had claimed that Say’ri was her everything.

 

As the campaign progresses, Say'ri must often remind herself that the woman is the enemy.

 

 

 

When Aversa is slain through the combined efforts of the Shepherds’ tactician and the Exalt’s daughter, Say’ri rejoices during the celebrations much like anybody else. The hint of sadness that she feels as she gazes upon the body is easy enough to hide.

 

Nobody _knows_.

 

 

 

Aversa returns only days later, but Say’ri does not feel conflicted. She cannot afford to. Aversa is still the enemy, or at the very least, she is not an ally.

For a reason that Say’ri cannot explain, however, she detests the sight of Aversa alone in the corner, unable to look at any of them as they fight mirrored versions of themselves. She fells the mirror version of the tactician’s wife with a stroke of Amatsu, her brother’s sword, and the bolstering second wind that has become part of her movements since her training as a dark flier allows her the strength to venture off to the side of the chamber, where Aversa remains frozen in place.

She appears, for the first time since Say’ri has known her, frightened.

“Why do you not join the fray?”

“I seek only the truth…when I do join the battle, _should_ I join the battle, it will be to confront that which dares to assume my shape,” says Aversa mildly, fingering the edges of a tome Say’ri has seen, but never once wielded. Nosferatu. “You know that I would rather not die, if I could help it.”

“The Shepherds have come to your aid and you would watch them die, and do nothing to assist those who have chosen to lay down their lives for one so undeserving as you? Fie! For shame!” To say that she is disgusted would be an understatement. Say’ri knows that there are honour codes of all kinds in the world—that even brigands and thieves have concepts of honour and justice—but this woman, this _foolish_ , damnable woman, does not care about any of that, it seems.

She has not changed at all.

The dark woman turns bodily towards Say’ri, nudging the black pegasus underneath her with the slightest pressure of her knees. A sharp-nailed finger twists slow circles in the air, as if gesturing to the wide space around them as if it were not so wide at all. “And who is to say that all this is for me or for my sake at all? I am sure that my appearance has piqued the curiosities of your masters,” Aversa sneers then, twisting her features into something too sad to be ugly, “But I did not ask to be fought for, Princess Say’ri. The Boy-King and his dauntless tactician have chosen to follow me, and this is the price of their curiosity. You would do well to remember that.”

Aversa raises her arm properly and the scent of dark magic fills the air; Say’ri knows that she will not be quick enough but she throws her sword up in front of her anyway…and Say’ri is unharmed, though the mirror-image of the tactician’s child stares glassily back at her when she turns. “And you would do well to remember that we are on the battlefield at present.”

Say’ri does not have the time to say anything—not a condemnation nor a word of surprised thanks—before Aversa spots her own mirrored image, and the black pegasus sails away towards its twin.

 

 

 

Say’ri does not get a chance to properly thank the woman—Aversa—before the battle’s end, and then Aversa is swept away by a concerned Exalt, asking her if she will find her absolution fighting for the Shepherds, and by an even more concerned grandmaster who bravely calls the dark woman “sister”. Sister in suffering, perhaps, Say’ri thinks idly. She does not realize that she is watching the trio retreat until Aversa turns and her dark eyes gleam in the dim light.

Aversa puts a hand on Robin’s arm, whispers something in a slithering tongue that Say’ri cannot understand though the sound echoes clearly enough across the cavernous depths of the chamber. Robin nods, looking back at Say’ri with a smile, and then she pulls ahead of Aversa with the Exalt in tow. The dark woman waits for Say’ri to approach, beckoning with one finger when the princess of Chon’sin does not move.

“We are no longer enemies, princess. I won’t bite.” The woman’s full lips quirk into a sly grin. “Unless you want me to.” Aversa’s teeth catch at her bottom lip for but a second, and Say’ri does her best not to stare. “I seem to recall you enjoying that.”

“Lady Aversa,” Say’ri says, fighting to keep her voice level and her eyes on the ground, “I have come only to do what is right. You saved my life this day, and for that I am grateful. I hope to one day return the favour.”

“I’d rather if you didn’t,” Aversa says, and Say’ri is surprised at her tone. It is more sad than sharp; more desolate than anything else. “I find that, all things considered, the idea of a life for a life no longer holds the same appeal it once did.”

“I would still repay you for saving my life,” Say’ri says.

Aversa looks her up and down. The feeling is familiar. “In time, perhaps, you shall.”

 

Say’ri watches as the woman walks off without another word, and sighs. Lady Aversa may no longer be an enemy, but she is still unsettling…and Say’ri cannot say that she knows why that is.


	6. Fame - Cynthia x Nah

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They have saved the world, and they are heroes, and yet Nah cannot help but wish that they had never come into their fame.

It’s just the two of them together on a hilltop, sitting propped up against a tree as the sun sets over Ylisstol—the first calm evening they’ve had in the last two months.

 

Sometimes, Nah wishes they hadn't announced their marriage to the public..

It is not that she does not love her wife.

It is not that she is not proud of the woman she loves.

It is not that she wants to be thought of as single.

All that it is, is that Nah wants, more than anything, for peace now that Grima has been vanquished. Peace now that Lucina sits atop what had once been her father’s throne as she guides the people of Ylisse into new prosperity. Peace now that all of them have begun to follow their chosen paths following the fall of a would-be god.

 

Peace now that they _finally_ have a chance at happiness that is both real and lasting.

 

With Cynthia at her side there is constant happiness, but _peace_ —in the sense of tranquility—is not often a visitor upon their doorstep; instead it is a combination of her worshippers and Cynthia’s fans that comes knocking at their door at ungodly hours of the night and all throughout each and every day.

Nah does not mind being worshipped—although on some level it _does_ strike her as strange that these people are so willing to do anything and everything that she asks—but it _had_ been much easier to hide away from the clamour of needy voices before she and Cynthia took the final step in sharing their lives with each other.  Before, when she and Cynthia had lived separately, she had been able to lock her doors and leave them locked, sneaking out under the cover of night to spend a few days rest within the castle, or in the home of one of the Shepherds. Now that she and Cynthia share a home, this is simply not possible.

Cynthia’s fans— _admirers_ , as Nah’s wife insists they be called—are extremely knowledgeable of their idol’s schedule. While this means that Cynthia’s patrols are perhaps more busy than usual due to admirers causing some petty mischief or other, and while this means that Cynthia is always able to indulge in her showy acts of heroism, it also means (and this is what bothers Nah) that these admirers are well aware of what time Cynthia returns home. Or, more specifically, what time Cynthia returns to the home where she is Cynthia of the Ylissean Pegasus Knights and, more importantly for some of Cynthia’s admirers, somebody’s _wife_.

Which, Nah thinks, can be problematic especially when one has a wife like hers—a wife who rather enjoys making everything she does into some form of spectacle or other.

If it weren’t for the fact that she loves the other woman with every fibre of her being, Nah would have refused to play along with Cynthia’s “grand return home” every single day after the first incident. One particularly inspired admirer had managed, somehow, to sneak past both Nah and her wife. They hadn’t honestly even thought such a thing were a possibility, and when they finally realized that there was a third in the house the pair of them spent _hours_ searching for what had turned out to be a very enthusiastic hero-worshipper who believed Cynthia to be “the greatest Pegasus Knight in the entire history of the world”. Nah still remembers the way that Cynthia had beamed and balked almost simultaneously.

She thinks she would be able to remember such a charming reaction better if she hadn’t spent so much time trying to keep the young man’s hands _off_ of her wife.

 

To be fair, of course, it isn’t as if her…acolytes…are any better. In truth, some of them are even _worse_. At least Cynthia is being worshipped as a human hero. Nah doesn’t even want to know what has to go on in a person’s head for them to be so grabby—so _intentionally inappropriate_ —with a supposed link to the Divine Dragon.

 

Nah laughs to herself. Her wife’s jealous, possessive streak is just about as wide as her own, and to be honest (and it’s probably slightly shameful for a defender of the peace to admit this) that very same streak has been the cause of quite a few altercations between the pegasus knight and worshippers of “the Voice”—which, if Nah is still being honest, is not at all who or what she is. She might appear to be Tiki’s spiritual successor—though of course, being the last manakete in the known world will kind of force public opinion into thinking that—but there’s more to her than that, something that Exalt Lucina knows and has tried to spread throughout Ylisse.

In that sense, Nah feels that she’s something like her wife. They do have some similarities between them, mutual fame notwithstanding. Hidden depths exist in both of them, as in all people, after all. Cynthia might appear to be all sunshine and sparkles, but Nah knows better, just like how she’s certain that Cynthia knows that there are times when Nah just really wants to be free to do as she pleases—free in a way she’d never been as a child.

 

That’s why she appreciates things like this that Cynthia does for her. Things like sneaking away from the allures of being a famous war-hero to spend a quiet evening on a hilltop with her wife. Things like loving Nah.

 

The moment won’t last forever, of course—and in a way, it’s somehow funny that the fame that deprives them of having an entire life lived this way _will_ —but when Nah looks into Cynthia’s wide eyes and sees the rest of her life she is contented and at peace.

 

Cynthia strokes her cheek. “I love you, Nah.”

“More than your fans?” She’s teasing.

“More than my fans and your followers and everything else in the world.”


	7. Gallantry - Tharja x Cordelia (Part Three)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cordelia has been raised into gentility, and her wife deserves such treatment.

A few nights before the battle with Grima, she and Tharja are wed, and though the ceremony is small and only barely official, it is the source from which Cordelia draws her strength.

 

 

 

The world after Grima is not as different as anybody would have liked to believe it would be, particularly in Ylisstol, but Cordelia stands her ground against the sneers that take over the faces of the Ylissean court when she brings home her Plegian bride. Her father and mother appear…rather disappointed, if she’s being honest, and she knows without looking that they are wondering what has gone wrong with her. She ignores them as best as she can, but the other nobles are ugly in their hatred—almost too ugly to bear.

 

Yes, the threat to the world has been vanquished, but the hatred in the heart of humanity lives yet.

 

Tharja is strong, as she always is, but even she is discomfited by the open hostility that comes off of the richly-dressed Ylisseans in waves—Cordelia can tell from the way that her wife’s fingernails dig into her arm; the sharpened tips breaking skin enough that droplets of blood rise to the surface. It hurts, but barely. Normally Tharja is far too careful with her for such a thing to happen.

She cannot blame her wife for her distraction, of course.

This animosity is far from _normal_.  

 

“Why are they staring?” Tharja asks, and Cordelia takes the paler woman’s hand in one of her own. “They think that you have married beneath you, isn’t it?” Her voice is not made of the same dry humour that it usually is, and that is upsetting. Cordelia does not like to hear her wife so disheartened. In response, she laces an arm around Tharja's waist—the fruit of Naga’s promise to them has already begun to present itself. Another problematic gift to be dealt with at another time. "Cordelia..."

She responds first by brushing the back of her wife’s hand with her thumb, and then leaning down to kiss that same hand in a gesture that is as gentle and courtly as it is full of genuine love. Cordelia does not care who is watching, does not care if her actions will be considered indecent in some way. She loves Tharja wholeheartedly, and she will not have her wife be uncomfortable because of old (and incorrect) preconceptions as to the character of Plegian women.

 

 

Later on, during the Shepherds’ banquet, Cordelia can tell that several members of both the Major and Minor councils are displeased when she uses a handkerchief to wipe at the corners of her wife’s mouth—Tharja is too nervous to eat in her usual neat way—and so she makes sure to put as many acts of gallantry on display as she can. She will antagonize the bigoted men and women before her, and she will be better than them, and treat her wife like the wonderful person she is in the process.

Cordelia is glad that her pettiness can be covered up in the name of chivalry, and the way that Tharja smiles at her as they dance is worth the exasperated looks from her parents and the scowls of some of her childhood acquaintances. She makes sure to always offer an elbow to Tharja when the latter feels the need to walk about, and she keeps her tone and her voice polite and sweet throughout the evening. 

 

 

 

Her resolve does not falter even when she returns to her ancestral home with Tharja at her side. Her parents are waiting, displeasure in their every aspect. Cordelia does not care one whit for their prejudices, and makes her expectations known. She is a genteel woman, a noblewoman even though theirs is not a Major House, and such status (and all the courtesies extended towards bearers of it) is to be shared with Tharja.

“Oh? And are we to expect that that… _creature_ will benefit from the status originally conferred upon _our_ ancestors while _hers_ were probably little more than heathens?”

 

It is the first time in her life that Cordelia raises her voice against her mother.

 

Her father attempts to take on a more reasonable tack with her. When he speaks, he is polite, and though he occasionally glances at Tharja as if she were little more than furniture, he is not as outwardly antagonistic as Cordelia’s mother; something that she appreciates even though it is the very _least_ he could do. “Now Cordelia, your mother might have chosen her words more carefully, but the fact remains. Does your…does she know how to act in accordance with what is expected of the wife of an Ylissean noble? Or will your choice of spouse only prove even more of a disappointment than she already has?”

Cordelia stiffens at the insult and at the implication as she wraps a protective arm around her wife’s waist. Before she can speak, however, Tharja does. Her voice is laced with the chilling toxicity that Cordelia remembers from Tharja’s earliest days amongst the Shepherds.

“I may not know much about your standards for the present, but I will learn. For Cordelia’s sake…and because I don’t like the idea of my own parents-in-law thinking that I don’t know how to be a good little noble.”

 

Cordelia’s father, to his credit, only blinks uncomfortably a few times before dismissing them with a curt nod.

 

 

 

Later, in the quarters that they now share, Cordelia takes her wife into her arms and whispers apologies into her neck. In response, Tharja only kisses her sweetly. “Enough about that; you have done more than enough these last few hours.” The soft smile on her face turns into one with which Cordelia is even more familiar; a wicked grin that promises wonderful things. “And now…would you like a reward for your good behaviour?”

 

Cordelia smiles in response and nods, pressing a kiss to Tharja’s hand.

 

It is her last gallant act of the evening.


	8. Soar - Maribelle x Cherche

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Maribelle is in need of flight lessons, and the Shepherds' newest recruit has been given the task.

The woman waiting for her in the clearing is attractive in a contrasting way—muscular and yet feminine; noble and yet…sexually appealing. Maribelle immediately approves when the other woman opens her mouth and good, proper speech comes out. Her accent is singularly charming, something that distracts the Ylissean noblewoman enough that she almost forgets to understand the words.

“Hello, milady, I am Cherche, a vassal of House Virion. I've been instructed to take you aloft on Minerva, my wyvern. Are you prepared?”

If Maribelle is being honest, she isn’t, because she doesn’t necessarily _want_ to be a dark flier even though she knows that Robin is only thinking about what would be best for the army as a whole. Maribelle must admit that it would certainly be nice to be able to recover so quickly after defeating an enemy, but the thought of being that high in the air…is daunting.

Ever since childhood, Maribelle has been afraid of heights—embarrassingly so.

As if sensing her hesitation, Cherche takes a step closer, holding out a hand as if to a scared animal, or a child. “Please, milady, I assure you. Minerva and I have been flying together for more than a decade, often with a passenger. You will be as safe in the air with us as you are here on the ground.”

Maribelle does not know if it is the earnest tone of Cherche’s voice or the way that she smiles so gently, but whatever it is, it convinces her to take the other woman’s hand. She does not let go until she is seated in Minerva’s saddle and Cherche instructs her to hold on tightly.

Maribelle looks askance at the woman before blushing—Cherche’s hands are already wrapping Maribelle’s arms around her waist. “My apologies for the impropriety of all of this, milady, but I’d rather you didn’t fall off of Minerva—and especially not during your first flight.”

Maribelle only nods, trying her best not to squeeze the woman too tightly. It would be improper. She must take effort not to act out of turn—after all, she is a lady. Her sentiments are put to waste when the wyvern beneath them pushes into the air and it is all Maribelle can do not to burrow her face into the spot between Cherche’s well-defined shoulder blades. Maribelle does not know if she has ever felt so frightened for her life.

At least, when she’d been kidnapped and taken over the Plegian border, she’d been able to _do_ something.

Up here, in the air, she can either stay astride the powerful creature beneath her or fall to her death.

 

Still, she must admit that the view from the sky—when she manages to open her eyes for longer than a second to look somewhere other than Cherche's back—is breathtaking.

 

When they land Cherche helps her to dismount. “I apologize if we were a bit more enthusiastic than we should have been—it has been a while since Minerva and I have had a passenger…and longer still since one has been so charming.” The words are accompanied by a slightly more mischievous smile, and while Maribelle would normally label anyone else with such a smile as a roué or a philanderer she finds that, on Cherche, the roguish look is nothing if not utterly charming “How did you feel about your first time aloft, milady?”

Maribelle looks the other woman in the eyes and makes a decision. With the sweetest voice she can muster without being cloying, she says, “Please, Cherche…call me Maribelle.”

Cherche’s eyes light up, and her head dips for a second, perhaps in recognition.

Maribelle clears her throat demurely, ignoring the rising heat on her face before she continues, saying, “I must admit that I am still not wholly comfortable with flight but…this was rather enjoyable, indeed.”

Cherche smiles at her again, and Maribelle takes a second to admire just how even and white the knight’s teeth are—her smile is compellingly beautiful. “If you’re to become a flier yourself, it would be helpful to overcome any fear of heights you might have. Minerva and I would be delighted to take you up again.”

“I fear that my hesitations may not be so easily overcome,” Maribelle says, and she does her best to look truly fearful of the possibility. She steps closer to Cherche, hoping that she has not misread the situation.

She has not.

Cherche takes a step closer to her as well, and when the pink-haired woman speaks it is with an edge of something exciting in her tone. “I’d be happy to take you up as many times as you’d like, Maribelle.”

Maribelle feels a strong, yet gentle hand ghosting over her arm—Cherche’s hand—and she fights the urge to sharply draw in her breath. She fails, and so Cherche’s offer is met with a shaky, “Would you really? Are you sure?”

Cherche laughs, hand dropping to take one of Maribelle’s.“For a noble, you're rather forward, Maribelle.” Before she can really process what is happening the knight has pressed her wind-roughened lips to the back of her hand, and Maribelle knows that her face must be as red as Sully’s hair by now. Cherche speaks again, gently releasing Maribelle’s hand. “And yes, I’m quite sure, my dear. I shall teach you to fly.”

"Thank you." Maribelle smiles and nods, then watches the ripple and flex of Cherche’s back as the older woman walks away, only to be met with the sight of that charming smile once more.

 

 

 

 

Maribelle takes the older woman up on that offer again a few days later.

And then again.

And then again.

And then again.

She becomes a dark flier, and still the lessons on Minerva continue.

 

 

 

When Cherche’s lips touch hers as Minerva cuts through the clouds on their seventh or eighth flight, Maribelle realizes that she has not been taught to _fly._

Cherche has taught her how to  _soar_.


	9. Ink - Severa x F!Morgan

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There's at least on thing about Morgan that remains the same, and Severa notices.

She places a hand on Morgan’s cheek, tracing a smudge of the ink that seems to just perpetually be there.  Morgan doesn't recognize her, but that's fine, because at least Morgan is alive.

 

 

 

Severa finds that she is more patient with Morgan than anybody else. That, at least, is the same as how things had been back home.

As it becomes clear that Morgan isn’t just trying to pull an elaborate prank, Severa tries to stop being so _nice_. It's not that she wants to be insensitive, but she just doesn’t want to confuse the younger girl, or make her feel obliged to love her back—it hadn’t worked that way in the ruined world they came from.

Of course, now that it’s very obvious as to whom Severa’s been pining after since joining the Shepherds—not that she’s been doing anything so _stupid_ of course—Robin and Cordelia have gotten into their heads to put the two girls together as much as humanly possible and Severa. Hates. It.

 

But not really, obviously, because it’s _Morgan_ and she…oh, whatever.

 

Morgan’s eyes barely flutter up to meet hers when Severa walks into her tent. “Hi Severa!”

“Cordelia said you and I are doing the weapons checks today...”

“Sure,” says Morgan. “Just give me a minute.”

Were it anybody else Severa would have already left, but she can’t just _leave_ Morgan. Not when the other girl is…supposed to help her with the most god-awful chore, right, yes. There’s _no_ way she’s going to the weapons tent without Morgan, because Morgan is supposed to be her helper.

Her partner.

Not the way she used to be, but her partner nonetheless.

That last bit sounds so pathetic, even just in her head, that Severa very nearly tweaks her own nose out of spite.

“Okay then, let’s go!” says the younger girl, screwing on the lid of her inkpot so tightly that Severa just _knows_ Morgan is going to make a mess of herself later on in the evening. She’s already started, if the black smudges on her pale palms are anything to go by; Severa almost says something about it before she catches herself.

It’s not her place to fuss over Morgan like this.

She’s about to lead them out and take the familiar path leading back to the weapons tent when she stops, and for a moment she just stares at Morgan, who’s only just now noticing the still-wet ink on her hands.

As always, the sleeves of her treasured tactician’s cloak are pristine.

“You might wanna loosen the lid,” she says, gesturing to Morgan’s desk even as her foot begins to creep towards the entrance to Morgan’s tent. “Otherwise it’ll just spill all over everything else when you try to open it up later.”

Morgan stares back at her for a moment before smiling that broad, dopey, _adorable_ grin and Severa can’t help the tiny smile from appearing on her own lips as Morgan bounces over to her desk and carefully loosens the inkpot’s lid. “Thanks Severa! You’re much nicer than people think you are!”

 

Severa scoffs lightly in response and follows Robin’s daughter all the way to the weapons tent, eyes catching hints of ink on Morgan’s hands as she swings her arms.

 

 

 

If it isn’t weapons checks, it’s inventory or shopping or mess hall cleanup or meal preparation or scouting or any other number of activities that involve them being in the same place at the same time and Severa has begun to look forward to and dread every day’s new task in equal measures.

  With the exception of her missing memory, Morgan is much the same way she was back in their original timeline; bubbly and sweet with hints of a more sadistic personality beneath, but understanding and kind and intelligent and basically exactly the same beautiful person she’d been—the beautiful girl who’d taken Severa’s heart and never given it back (though she cringes to admit something so cheesy). The closer they get to each other (and they _do_ get rather close in a short time) the worse Severa feels.

 

Because they’re with their parents once more and everything should be perfect, except that _Morgan doesn’t want her_.

 

 

 

On the morning before Chrom is to perform the Awakening, Severa is sent to fetch Morgan for a quick scout of the perimeter. She walks into the young tactician’s tent without knocking, and is unsurprised to find that Morgan is asleep, quill still clutched in her fingers, cheek pressed to the parchment beneath her.

“Morgan?”

No answer.

Severa tries again, putting a gentle hand on Morgan’s shoulder. “Morgan, wake up. I don’t want to get in trouble because of you.”

The young tactician stirs and her eyes open slowly, brightening when her gaze flits up to meet Severa’s. “Good morning, Severa.”

Morgan is still sleep-sweet and slow, and Severa melts just a little as the younger girl rubs her eyes. “Good morning, Morgan,” she says, unsure of why she is whispering. Try as she might to curb her preferential behaviour, she really can’t seem _not_ to act like this around Morgan. “We have to do perimeter surveillance.”

“Okay,” Morgan says sleepily, and as her head rises from the desk Severa takes in the streak of ink staining the girl’s skin. She itches to wipe it away, but resists…and so of course she ends up neglecting to mention it altogether as she and Morgan go about their rounds.

 

It’s on the way back from the perimeter when Morgan takes Severa’s hand and Severa immediately worries at her bottom lip. “What is it?”

“Hey…you like me, right?”

“W-what are you _talking_ about, Morgan?”

Morgan’s eyes, now completely focus, dance when they catch hold of hers. “I _mean_ , you have feelings for me, right? Like my feelings for you.”

 

Severa fidgets and blusters for about three full minutes before giving up and (finally) letting her fingers swipe at the now-dried ink on Morgan’s cheek. “What was your first clue?”


	10. Quiet - Lucina x Tiki

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In the silence that follows victory, Lucina finds that she has never felt so alone.

Tiki is gone.

Lucina loved her.

Still loves her.

She remembers the feeling of cool hands on her arm and soft lips on her own, and she shivers. Tiki had always been gentle with her, always so caring and kind. She had always done her best to make Lucina feel at ease during the hours they spent together—the stolen hours in which Tiki had refused to allow her to worry.

Without the divine dragon’s daughter by her side Lucina feels adrift; like she is more soldier than ruler; like she and her friends are only children playacting as saviours of the world. She fears for her people, afraid of what will become of those who have survived the ravaging of the world. If Tiki were here, she would already have a solution. If Tiki were here, they…

 

Lucina brushes off her concerns at the sight of a passing butterfly—something about the glimmer of its sky-bright wings is calming.

 

The first few days are spent in half-hearted celebration of their triumph over the Fell Dragon, but the joy does not last long before the reality of the situation settles in and Lucina realizes that now, the real work must begin. She sequesters herself in what had once been her father’s office and writes letters—letters to be sent to Plegia and Rosanne and Ferox and Chon’sin—in the hopes that there are still nations outside of her own that have survived the rise of Grima. When those are finished, she begins to write one last message, to be delivered to the Mila Tree, only to pause and then quit the office with her work left unfinished.

In the whirl of the festivities she had almost forgotten…

As it happens, Khan Basilio and Khan Flavia are alive but barely, and are trying to establish order in the midst of the chaos. Rosanne and Plegia have fallen. Empress Say’ri is too wounded to travel, but her people have rallied around her and Chon’sin is faring better than most other nations on the Valmese continent. Ylisstol no longer burns, but it is quiet, still too quiet, and Lucina rules over a broken people as she struggles to bring their world back together.

 

 

 

It is _grueling_ work, but with the help of her cousin and her brother and her friends Lucina pulls through, and then it is six months later and there is some semblance of normalcy in Ylisse. Walls have been rebuilt, alliances reborn, shattered families reunited as best as they can be. It is a beautiful thing. Her friends, the Shepherds, all return to the lives that should have been theirs, though some remain at her side in Ylisstol in spite of callings outside of Ylisse.

She is grateful for their support, as she always has been, but she cannot shake the feeling that things are not right. The city still feels eerily quiet sometimes. Her chambers, where she goes to rest and wakes alone each day, feel the same way.

It is not that she misses the din of battle (she does not) and it is not that she wishes to hear once more the sounds of the dying, but the peace is…bereft of something. Some particular sounds. Sounds that had been present even during the worst days of Lucina’s life. Sounds—of joy, of comfort—that now cannot be found even though…

Even though Tiki had said that she would always be there.

Lucina knows that it is childish to blame Tiki for becoming Naga. She knows that to do that would be to blame Tiki for helping them to save the world…but still; she does not know how she can ever recover from being so thoroughly abandoned.  Even if the abandonment was necessary, even if Tiki had kissed her before disappearing into Naga’s realm and told her that she would forever be loved…it’s painful.

Her life, in spite of all its business, is quiet, far too quiet.

It takes her only a moment to note that when she says (or thinks) _quiet_ , what she really means is _empty_.

 

 

 

It is after a full year of the silence that she finally decides that she is ready, and she makes preparations for a journey that should have been undergone immediately following the final battle. On the morning she intends to depart, she summons Severa to her side. She sits in her father’s chair in silence, hands stroking the lid of the most precious urn in Castle Ylisstol as she waits. As a sister in the Ylissean Pegasus Knights Severa is never too far from her, but Lucina is alone for a full half-hour after sending her summons.

When she walks in, the twin-tailed woman takes one look at the urn in Lucina’s lap before letting out an overdrawn, “Finally” and then they are walking towards the stables. For the first time in years, Lucina mounts a black pegasus—her mother’s, once upon a time—and takes to the open sky. The voyage is a blur of flying and trading quiet words with Severa during brief rests, but in a week’s time Lucina finds herself at the summit of Mount Prism.

Severa walks her into the temple, then walks out.

 

She and the other Shepherds have long since purged the place of the influence of the Risen, but it is only now that Lucina has had the time to return Naga’s power to its rightful place. That is what she tells herself, at least, as she sets the urn down on the restored altar and says a quick prayer. Tears slide slowly down her cheeks, hotter than she’d been expecting, and she stifles a small sob.

A breeze enters the temple, playing with her hair and caressing her skin, and it feels so very like Tiki that Lucina cannot stop herself.

“Tiki, I’ve missed you so much.”

The breeze flirts with her hair for a second longer before it dies away.

 

Once more, Lucina is enveloped in quiet.


	11. Kingdom - Emmeryn x Sully

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sully isn't a romantic but there's that one story her mother used to tell her, about the queen who loved her kingdom and the knight who loved her...

When Sully is young she plays at swords with a boy with blue hair, in a courtyard lined with flowers for which she does not know the names. There is always a young woman there too, with a child on her hip and sunlight hair and the gentlest eyes that Sully has ever seen, and she is beautiful and kind and she is the Exalt of the halidom of Ylisse. Her name is Emmeryn, and when she smiles Sully thinks that she is the most beautiful being to have ever existed.

At night Sully listens carefully as her mother reads to her. In the place of the chivalrous knight she pictures herself, and the kind-hearted queen is always, always Emmeryn. She does not know it at the time, but it is then that she begins to fall in love.

 

 

_“Once, there was a kingdom over which presided a most benevolent queen, and always by her side was a most gallant white knight…”_

 

 

The years pass and Chrom is stuck indoors much of the time, else training with Sir Frederick and unable to play, and so Sully takes to training by herself. Sometimes Emmeryn comes out to watch her. Sometimes, they even speak, and yet it takes Sully until the age of fourteen before she realizes that she acts the same way around Emmeryn as the other girls her age do around Chrom.

About a year after realizing that, she enrolls in the military academy. When she is asked why she wants to become a knight she gives the first response she can think of. “I want to protect Ylisse.” It is not a lie. She _does_ want to protect Ylisse, to protect the kingdom that she calls home; but even more than that she wants to protect the eldest daughter of _House Ylisse_ —she wants, more than anything, to protect Emmeryn.

 

 

_“Once, there was a kingdom over which presided a most benevolent queen, and always by her side was a most gallant white knight…”_

 

 

Becoming a knight is hard work but in a way, Sully doesn’t mind it. When the Shepherds—as Chrom insists they call themselves—begin to get to know each other, almost all questions directed to Sully on the topic of her rise to knighthood are met with, “it was boring and I kicked a lot of arse”. Of course, she doesn’t mention the nights she spent going through practice forms until her body was nothing but sweat, or the days she spent berating herself for tiny mistakes. She also doesn’t mention the times she’d snuck out to catch a glimpse of Emmeryn in the streets—a very effective, but _pathetic_ , form of encouragement during the particularly gruelling times.

As tensions with Plegia rise Sully fights for Chrom and listens to Robin and does her best to keep Emmeryn safe. On the night of the assassination attempt she is sent to the Exalt’s room, and there she is met with the sight of Emmeryn, still serene even though her life is in danger.

“I’ll defend you with my life, Your Grace,” Sully says, feeling her tongue slip back into the polite language of the court.

Emmeryn’s eyes, when they meet Sully’s, are sad even though she smiles. “Please don’t, Sully…I would not see your life lost for mine.”

Sully blinks, then smiles a little more shyly than she’d intended before the door is flung open and a thief enters the room. Her lance finds its way through his stomach quickly enough, and she sees the mysterious girl with the circlet on her head giving her a nod and telling her to stay close to the Exalt. Sully scoffs.

She doesn’t need to be told.

 

 

 

_“Once, there was a kingdom over which presided a most benevolent queen, and always by her side was a most gallant white knight…”_

 

 

 

The words of the old story feel like a lie, and Sully feels (some days) that she would have sooner watched her kingdom burn than watched Emmeryn’s fall. Of course, she never means it (mostly), because the woman she loved had loved Ylisse. At night, Sully dreams, and in her dreams Emmeryn falls and Emmeryn dies, and Sully is numb.

 

 

 

 

_“Once, there was a kingdom over which presided a most benevolent queen, and always by her side was a most gallant white knight…”_

 

The numbness lasts for years, until the day when the Shepherds encounter a girl who claims to be Sully’s daughter. All that Sully can see for a moment is sunlight hair and gentle eyes and when she asks the girl who her father is, she gets a snort in response that tells her that this truly is her child.

“Mom, I don’t mean to be rude but where’s Mother?”

Sully quirks an eyebrow, and she can feel Chrom’s eyes on her back, but she reins in the urge to splutter and gasp and instead says, “…What’s your mother’s name, Kjelle?”

Kjelle lifts her own brow, clearly unimpressed, and says, “ _Mom_ , how could you forget?”

“Kjelle,” Sully says, imitating her father’s sternest voice, “Her name?”

“Emmeryn,” Kjelle offers, and Sully’s eyes well up. “Uncle Chrom, why are you crying?”

Emmeryn is out there somewhere, out there somewhere alone and she needs to find her. She needs to find her and hold her and tell her that she has loved her for all these years. When she turns to face Exalt Chrom he smiles at her in spite of the tears that have been brought to his eyes, and she knows that somehow, _some way_ , they’ll find Emmeryn and bring her back to the kingdom she once called her home.

 

 

 

When they do find her, she is much changed, but Sully still loves her anyway.

 

They grow closer.

 

They defeat Grima.

 

They fall in love, until it feels even better than it once did; and one day, though Emmeryn is no longer a queen and Sully’s armour is wreathed in red, they return to Ylisse side by side.


	12. Leap - Sumia x Phila

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sumia listens to her parents and doesn't take risks. Until she meets Phila.

As a girl, Sumia is told that only the strongest of women can handle joining the knighthood. As a girl, Sumia is told that only the bravest of women can rightly claim a place as a sister in the Ylissean Pegasus Knights. As a girl, Sumia is told that she is not strong, nor brave, and that a girl as delicate as she is, as soft-spoken and timid, will never make it in the world of the Pegasus Knights.

As a girl, Sumia believes all these things about herself without question.

 

 

The day she meets Captain Phila, she is proven wrong.

 

 

She truly doesn’t mean to sneak into the training grounds (again) but last week Cordelia had shown her the little hole leading from the walled area of the garden to the place where the Pegasus Knights run their daily drills, and today, Sumia is lonely. She’d meant to find Cordelia and ask to be squirrelled away somewhere until the time came for the redhead to go home, but instead she’s here, half-hidden behind a tree, watching young woman train.

Sumia is enraptured.

At first glance, the woman—because she looks too strong, too mature to be called a _girl_ in Sumia’s eyes—appears to be nothing but a slip of a thing, with pale blue hair and bright maroon eyes and an altogether calming presence. As Sumia watches, however, the woman transforms into something fearsome; her strikes with the practice lance are sharp and quick, and Sumia thinks that she has never seen such beautiful, controlled violence.

Come to think of it, she’s never seen violence before.

Sumia doesn’t know how long it’s been before she hears a kind, though unfamiliar voice call out to her. “Excuse me, but this is a private training ground. Are you lost?” It is only when the woman’s strict gaze falls on her that Sumia realizes who she has been spying on for the better part of an hour, and she is immediately embarrassed.

This woman…is Cordelia’s captain!

“Uh-n-no ma’am!” She steps out from behind the tree, struggling to keep her eyes level with the captain’s. What was her name? Phyllis? No.

The captain seems to relax at the sight of Sumia, and then recognition takes the place of relief on her face. “I recognize you…you’re friends with Cadet Cordelia, are you not?”

Sumia blushes from head to toe, surprised. “Yes, ma’am.”

“You’re the same age as she, are you not? Why aren’t you training alongside her?”

Sumia thinks that there are a multitude of reasons for that, none of which she really needs to divulge and yet, when she considers the kindness in the captain’s eyes, she feels that she should at least be honest. “My parents say that I am not fit to be a Pegasus Knight…I’m not brave or strong enough. They tell me I wouldn’t make it through the training, to begin with.”

The captain studies her seriously for a moment, then takes a step, as if she means to close the distance between them. “And how would you know that unless you took that leap of faith and actually enlisted?”

Sumia squeaks out something in response and runs away.

 

Three weeks later, against her parents wishes (but with their begrudging consent), Sumia is enlisted as a Pegasus Knight Cadet and assigned the bunk underneath Cordelia’s. Captain Phila—because _that_ is the woman’s name—smiles at her on that first morning.

And every morning after that.

 

 

 

Sumia is sixteen when she has her first one-on-one training session with Captain Phila— “When it’s just us, I’m just Phila, Sumia”—and she is excited to learn. Cordelia is already a Pegasus Knight with a mount of her own, and Sumia, though she is sad to be without her best friend, cannot complain. She serves as Captain Phila’s favourite in the redhead’s stead, and though it is perhaps unethical, Sumia has developed a rather strong affection for the blue-haired woman who has taught her everything she knows about being a knight.

“Sumia, what is the one thing a Pegasus Knight must always do in battle?” Captain Phila’s voice carries so well even with the wind rushing past Sumia’s ears, and Sumia scrambles to come up with a good response.

“Uh-um…trust her mount?”

Captain Phila’s smile is warmer than the sunshine on Sumia’s shoulders. “Very good. Do you know why that is?” When Sumia shakes her head, the captain laughs, and before the cadet knows it, Captain Phila has slipped her ankles out of their straps. “When a Pegasus Knight trusts her mount, maneuvers that might have seemed impossible become second-nature.”

Sumia nearly screams when Captain Phila all but throws herself off her mount.

The sound catches in her throat and turns into an ugly, choked laugh when Captain Phila’s pegasus swoops through the air in a graceful circle before catching her rider as if it were nothing. Second-nature, as the captain had said. “Captain! How did you know she would c-catch you?”

 “In part, it’s because I trust her.” Captain Phila smiles and Sumia appreciates, not for the first time, just how hard she’s fallen for the woman in front of her. “In part, it’s a leap of faith.”

 

 

 

Sumia never forgets that first lesson with Captain Phila, although many more follow it. She completes her training, but joins Chrom’s Shepherds out of some sort of twisted belief that separating herself from Captain Phila—technically now just _Phila_ —will ease the longing that has begun to tear her in half.

She’s wrong.

Shortly after Chrom departs with Frederick and Lissa in tow, Sumia finds herself talking to Captain—to Phila in an otherwise empty hallway. She doesn’t quite know how it happened, and she can’t quite catch hold of the conversation, but Sumia doesn’t really care about that now, because Phila is…beautiful.

In what could be called one of the boldest moments of her life, Sumia takes the leap and leans forward to kiss her once-captain’s smile.

 


	13. Miracle - Nowi x Panne

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Finding love in the Shepherds when you're 1000 years old and look about 10? That's bound to require more magic than any miracle.

It isn’t as if Nowi can help that she looks like she’s barely begun the bleeding cycles—even though manaketes don’t bleed—but now that she’s past a thousand she’s begun to feel the urges, and without a mate…it’s difficult.

Nowi knows that it’s partially the fault of her appearance. Her youthfulness is off-putting to some (they write her off right away) and startlingly appealing to others (those are the soldiers she tells Robin and Chrom to watch out for when they pass through unallied towns) and if not either of those, it just makes it so that even the youngest among them—and here she always pauses in her thoughts to stare at Donnel or Ricken—don’t seem to realize that she is, in fact, open to romance.

She doesn’t think that she’ll find a mate this millennium around—not unless she gets really, _really_ lucky.

She isn’t upset about it. Not really. This is just the way that things are for her. She doesn’t think that she’s going to start looking like a human adult for a long while, either, and so realistically all that she can do is act the child and keep people entertained.

Or so she tells herself.

Nowi would be lying to say that she isn’t frustrated by how much even the human women seem to talk down to her, how much they seem to treat her like a child even though they’re typically better at acknowledging that she is, in fact, older than everybody in camp combined. Aside from Robin, who is genuine in her care for all the Shepherds, and Tharja, who humours Nowi until they become something resembling friends, Nowi feels strangely alone.

She wonders if it has something to do with her being something other than human.

As she watches Panne, who’d joined the Shepherds not too long before her, she thinks that that may have something to do with it. After all, Panne is the last of a the taguel. She understands what it feels like to be the lone survivor of a race that once numbered many. She, like Nowi, has spent more time out of human company than in it.

 

It is for these reasons, among others (like the near-crippling ache of her own loneliness), that Nowi approaches Panne.

At first it is difficult—the other woman is notoriously laconic—and yet, through sheer persistence (and perhaps luck) Nowi eventually manages to crack the taguel’s tough exterior. She and Panne become friends. They bond over being two of “the last” in the world. It’s nice, and decidedly unlike any other relationship Nowi has developed since becoming a Shepherd.

It’s shortly after they’ve really started to open up to one another that Nowi realizes that she’s fallen for her taguel friend.

 

They’re getting too close to the Mad King to risk setting up anything more elaborate than a cookfire or two, but Nowi doesn’t mind. She’s barely used to eating quite so much as she has during her time with the Shepherds, so scanter nights are more welcome than they should be. And besides, if she wanted to, she could just as easily sneak off in her dragon form and find a deer or two.

She wonders if Panne would like to hunt with her.

“Hello, little dragonkin,” Panne says when Nowi takes a spot on her log. Nowi smiles at the moniker, even though others have used it as a detraction.

“Hi, Panne!” says Nowi, defaulting into her usual expression. Dropping her voice into a whisper, she follows up with, “Would you like to come on a hunt with me?”

Panne’s eyes dip to the bowl in her hands. It is fine enough fare for a campaign such as this, but meagre nourishment for a taguel—or at least, Nowi thinks that it must be. She isn’t all that surprised when Panne nods surreptitiously in agreement and rises from the log, though she _is_ taken aback by how the older (looking) woman waits, looking expectantly down at her. “Well then?” At the barely-concealed eagerness in Panne’s voice Nowi rises too, and is bold enough to take Panne’s hand as she leads her off a good distance from the camp. She’s never taken Panne’s hand before.

If the taguel is confused she does not show it.

 

They hunt together, and Nowi is amazed at how gracefully such a large rabbit can bound through the Plegian sands. Hunting comes naturally to the taguel, and twice Nowi is so distracted by the sight of Panne that she does not manage to catch her own prey. Nowi is confused. She has never, never been distracted enough to miss a quarry.

She makes up for it soon afterwards, of course, but even a full stomach cannot quiet the din of the growing curiosity in her head that screams at her to get to know Panne better. Nowi tells herself to stop it. She doesn’t say much when Panne thanks her for the hunt, but she’s surprised when the taguel puts a hand on her shoulder and gives it a squeeze.

“Thank you, Nowi,” Panne says again. Warmly.

 

It’s as if all the pieces fall into place after that.

 

 

 

After Gangrel is defeated, she and Panne go off on an adventure together. They travel the continent. They bond. They fall in love. Panne does not care about what Nowi looks like, claiming that among the taguel, love is found in two matching spirits. As for Nowi, well, she’s felt this way for longer than she’d ever care to admit.

In a way, she supposes that it makes sense that she and Panne would have fallen together so naturally. They’ve bonded over being survivors, over being non-humans in a predominantly human environment, but to reduce what they have together to that, to Nowi, is wrong. As she curls up beside Panne in the little cave they’re calling “home”—for now—Nowi recognizes the woman beside her for what she is.

 

She’s a miracle.


	14. Attention - Noire x Kjelle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Noire is the observer who sometimes wishes she were the observed.

Noire just wants other people to notice her.

 

Not even all other _people_ , really, but at least _one_ other person; Kjelle.

 

There’s just so much to appreciate about Kjelle.

Like how she’s so strong and _knows_ it. Noire likes that about the other girl, that Kjelle knows that she’s strong. Unlike Noire, she’s never needed anybody to tell her that, because the proof is in the punches she throws. It’s in every thrust of her lance. It’s written into every line of her body, and sung with every flex of her muscles.

And even though Kjelle doesn’t have time for weaklings, she puts up with Noire—they’re sort of…friends, in fact, which Noire would love if she weren’t looking for a stronger relationship between them. Of course, there’s no way somebody as weak and ridiculous as her would catch the attention of a girl as wonderfully strong as Kjelle. She’ll have to work hard if she ever wants her feelings to have even half a chance.

The next day, Lucina tells her that she’s to pick up a bow, to help defend the walls against Risen attacks. Noire does her best to smile. It is her duty to defend Ylisstol just as much as anybody else’s, and besides, if having her on the walls can help to change the tide of things, that will be good enough for her.

She squeezes her mother’s talisman, feeling a familiar bolt of courage run through her.

 

 

Kjelle comes to speak with her as soon as the first raid warnings toll. She slings a strong arm up and across Noire’s slight shoulders and says, more gently than she’s ever spoken in front of her soldiers, “If things start to look too rough, I don’t want you to stay. You’ve got to make sure you get to safety.”

Noire doesn’t know if she should feel touched or offended. “It’s my duty to protect Ylisstol just as much as it is yours, Kjelle!” She stumbles out of the shorter girl’s side-armed hug and struggles to keep a hold of herself. Her mother’s talisman will be needed today, but certainly not for this.

“I didn’t mean it that way.” The knight looks up at Noire with sad eyes and says, so softly that Noire can barely make out the words, “I just…don’t want you to get hurt.”

Noire doesn’t have time to say something similar before Kjelle is already rushing towards the armory.

She hopes that they both make it through the day.

 

 

 

There is blood everywhere, and Noire no longer feels afraid as she rains arrows down on the Risen before they can climb the walls. She hears herself screaming out for blood and thunder and cursing something dreadful, but despite the bloodlust that seems to be part and parcel with relying on her mother’s talisman, Noire remains vigilant, one eye trained on Kjelle. The knight is doing very well, having fended off the first few waves almost entirely without support, but her energy, as Noire can tell even from up high, is waning.

She fires a round of arrows off at an axe-wielding Risen aiming to take off Kjelle’s arm. Kjelle spares a glance upwards and it looks like she’s mouthing at Noire to “Run!”, which makes sense because there are just so. Many. Risen. Too bad for them that Noire is in the _zone_ right now, even if Kjelle can’t see it from her place on the ground.

In response to the warning, Noire looses a wild cackle and shoots another arrow through the mush-filled skull of a Risen who’s come just a little too close to Kjelle’s side for her liking. Kjelle shakes her head and offers Noire a shaky smile before turning her attention back to the fight, and Noire spends the rest of the battle watching Kjelle’s back as closely as she can. Kjelle never looks up again, but she moves most of her unit about in such a way that they’re covering the wall while she’s playing a more active role in protecting the ladder under Noire’s post.

She knows that she shouldn’t be happy about that, but she is.

 

It’s hours before the remains of the Ylissean forces manage to completely repel the Risen—at least for now—but Noire is so focused on seeing that Kjelle makes it back into the safety of the city that she doesn’t notice the large Risen archer pulling back on its drawstring, one last arrow nocked and set to fly. She doesn’t notice the sound of the arrow ripping through the air. Doesn’t notice that anything is amiss really, until she’s falling forward, down, down into the city street, knocked off the wall because she’s only lightly armoured and the arrow is travelling so fast that it knocks the wind out of her.

As Noire falls, she thinks that she can see Kjelle staring up at her, terror in her eyes, and for some strange, sad, _sick_ reason, she thinks that this is as good a way to die as any. Her courage leaves her before she hits the ground. Her consciousness, however, lingers. It lingers long enough for her to catch sight of Kjelle’s armoured form rushing to her side, doffing pieces of the precious metal to move all the faster.

“You _idiot_! I told you to run! I told you I didn’t want you to get hurt!”

Kjelle isn’t crying, but she’s holding Noire gingerly, carefully, and Noire knows that if she doesn’t say something now, she’s never going to say it. Never going to have the chance.

 “I wanted…to protect you.”

“Why?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” Noire chuckles to herself, feeling the rush of iron in her mouth that signals the beginning of the end. “Or have you not been paying attention to me?”

 

 

 

Kjelle’s eyes are the last thing Noire sees, but they stare right into hers like she's the only thing that matters to the knight, and in that moment, that's all that Noire needs.

 


	15. Detriment - Sumia x Tiki

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Love is patient, love is kind, love is dangerous in dangerous times...or is that not how the rhyme is supposed to go?

Tiki cannot possibly think of allowing her lover to meet her death, but there are times when they are not partnered, times when they are required to be deployed together, but kept apart, given different partners to protect.

 

It is during one of these battles that Tiki watches the greatest fear of her life—in this moment, at least—nearly come to pass.

 

 

 

Sumia is partnered with the red-haired knight; not responsible Cordelia, but the coarse-mouthed, short-haired one that Tiki rather likes for her brusque nature. They fight well together, something that Tiki is happy for as she and the Exalt’s daughter take to the sky, Lucina on a dark-maned pegasus that had once been used by her mother, and Tiki seated behind her; to conserve her strength until it is most needed. She keeps a tight grip on her dragonstone as they soar, watching over Lucina’s shoulder in case the younger woman misses something.

Much as Tiki wants to protect Sumia from the arrows and spells that are being sent her way, she has a duty to the cause, and a duty to the princess—they have bonded well, and it would be a shame to lose a youth with a spirit so close to Marth’s. Not because she loves Lucina the way she once loved the Hero-King, but because there are people who turn to Lucina for her spirit, for her leadership, for her light. And because Chrom would have her head for failing his daughter.

“Lady Tiki!” A spell whizzes past her ear, singeing her hair.

She feels Lucina getting a spell ready, but the princess is still new to her magic. It may not be enough. Tiki throws herself from the pegasus as quickly as she can and transforms, spotting the threat. Her maw opens to let loose a ball of dragonfire, followed closely by Lucina’s Elwind. The sorcerer falls.

“We’ve done our part, Lucina,” she says, her dragon-distorted voice projecting over the din of battle.

Lucina nods. “Robin said to return to the oasis upon clearing our objective.”

“Then that’s what we shall do,” Tiki says, twisting through the air. She flies above Lucina, waiting for the princess’ signal. When Lucina lifts her hand, her pegasus levels it’s flight, and Tiki takes in a deep breath.

She’d been scared to do this sort of thing—millennia ago, with Caeda and others—but that fear is long gone as Tiki dismisses the flow of power stemming from the dragonstone in her hand. She drops back onto Lucina’s pegasus in her humanoid form, pocketing her stone for the moment before settling into her seat. There shouldn’t be any problems from here on out. The other teams seem to be managing just fine.

She’ll get to spend a quiet evening with Sumia after this.

 

That’s the thought that keeps her from shutting her eyes to the even swooping noises of the pegasus’ wings…and it’s a good thing that she stays awake. With the gift of her enhanced vision she can just make out the shape of Sumia’s alicorn as it struggles through the air—there’s a wound in one of its wings, making flight difficult. Tiki is immediately alarmed. She knows that Sumia’s spear is older, worn, and that it will not be enough to defend her lover while she is still surrounded, protecting Sully. Neither of them looks to be in fighting form anymore.

Before Lucina notices what’s happening, Tiki whips her dragonstone out of her pocket and jumps off the pegasus, taking to the air with more speed than she’s done in a while. Her wings, unused to working so hard, sing unhappily with the pressure she’s exerting, but she doesn’t care. She needs to get to Sumia. She needs to save Sumia.  

“Tiki, wait, he has a—

Tiki doesn’t wait for her lover’s warning, incensed by the sight of blood flowing from a wound across Sumia’s chest, an angry red gash torn from Sumia’s thigh. Sully too, looks badly beaten, the patches of skin visible through her assassin’s armour bloodied and purple, and Tiki wonders how this could have happened when only moments ago, they had seemed fine. “Go!”

She’s so concerned with seeing to Sumia’s safety that she doesn’t even notice the swordmaster bearing a Wyrmslayer in her direction until he’s caught her by the wing. She snarls as she tears his head apart, watching to make sure that Sumia’s alicorn makes it back to the oasis safely.

 

Robin chastises her for her rashness later, but Tiki isn’t upset as soon as she sees Sumia running towards her, arms outstretched and relief plain on her face. She swings the falcon knight around in her arms before holding her as close as she can. She hadn’t thought she could feel _this much_ fear.

When night falls and they are together in Tiki’s tent, she knows that she is clingier than usual, more desperate, more intense. She cannot help it. Tiki has made many lovers in her life, made them of soldiers and scholars, of artisans and aristocrats.

 

Never has she made a lover out of one sworn to such a dangerous cause.

 

Never has she made a lover out of one alongside whom she is expected to fight.

 

Never has she made a lover out of one whom she would be so pained to lose.

 

It is a new experience, and one that Tiki wholly appreciates, though in all honesty she cannot say she would like to repeat this. This level of sentiment, of caring, it…is dangerous. It is unprofessional. It is detrimental to the safety of everyone within the Shepherds, because she cannot be expected to focus on anybody else when the woman with whom she shares her bed has taken over her thoughts so completely. And yet she is, as she must be. As she holds Sumia, she finds that she doesn’t care.

If their love is dangerous, if their love is a detriment to the cause…

 

Then so be it.


	16. Fascination - Panne x Maribelle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She'd thought herself something of a skilled observer of humans, but Panne clearly has a little more to learn.

She doesn’t like to pry into the affairs of the man spawn, but this involves a fellow Shepherd.

“Human, what do you think you’re doing?”

The man she’s just addressed blinks at her through bleary eyes. Panne can smell alcohol on his breath. He’s not in his right mind. Not that that excuses acting like a pig, of course. “Aw, we was just tryin’ ta see if the lady wanted to ‘ave a bit of fun wiv us!” His friends, who up until this point have been laughing and jeering, seem to have lost their throats.

“And I _gave_ you an answer, after which you _still_ insisted upon laying a hand on me. A hand which I would very much like to see _released_ from my person, if you wouldn’t mind.”

Panne doesn’t quite know how a person can be cheeky in so dangerous a position—even with her around—and yet the blonde (whose name Panne cannot say she remembers) is _brazen_ in her defiance of the situation. The man holding her dainty wrist winces visibly before releasing her and wandering out of the tent with his friends, not that Panne really notices. She’s too focused on the way that the blonde dusts off her frilly sleeves before turning her attention to Panne.

“Thank you very much, Panne. You were most helpful in alleviating me of the headache those hoodlums were giving me.”

“They are soldiers here; your allies,” Panne says, noting that she cannot bring herself to say _our_ allies—as if there is some reason as to why she cannot lump the young lady with herself, though there is nothing wrong with her at all. Perhaps it is her awareness of the human propensity towards offense at perceived slights, but Panne does not think that the young woman would take too kindly to being put in the same group as a Taguel.

She doesn’t know why she cares to be so delicate in the face of such possible idiocy, but she’s already chosen her words.

“Hm,” the blonde says, curling her fine nose up in such a way that Panne thinks is almost…cute. How strange. “Well regardless of how boorishly _some_ of our comrades seem to wish to act, I’m pleased that _you_ are so noble of spirit. Thank you again for your assistance, Panne, and good night.”

“You’re welcome, and good night, ah…”

“Maribelle,” says the blonde, and she offers Panne a prim smile before slipping out of the mess tent.

 

Panne can’t help but find Maribelle completely and totally fascinating, a feeling which continues to grow in force following their night-time encounter in the mess tent.

 

At first Panne thinks that it must be something about the blonde’s pelt, er…hair. It’s just such a lovely, lustrous yellow colour—as if somebody had spun starlight mixed with just a touch of moonlight. But no, that can’t be it.

She watches Maribelle a bit more, trying to come up with an answer.

 

Next, she thinks that it must be the way that the blonde speaks. Humans all have their own ways of delivering words, but Maribelle’s is obviously something that she was taught, something that she now strives to teach to others—though nobody appears to want to give her the time.

No, Panne thinks, that couldn’t be the source of her fascination. The speech patterns of the blonde human—of Maribelle—while interesting and admittedly pleasant to the ear, are not what has her so intrigued.

 

She watches still more. Sometimes Maribelle’s eyes catch hers, but the blonde never rebukes her—in fact, sometimes it appears as if she is smiling for Panne, which is strange but not, as the Taguel later will admit to herself, unwelcome.

 

 

 

Eventually, Panne comes up with what she believes is the reason. She’s confused by Maribelle. This is a young woman who dresses the way that the old Exalt—the murderous one and not the kind Lady Emmeryn—had once dressed, who speaks in a fine accent and wears fine clothes and does not care to socialize with many of the people in camp. Yet here she is, smiling at Panne and thanking her for doing little more than speak up, and healing Panne’s injuries almost before she has a chance to feel them, and…well, and treating Panne as if they were friends and not merely two soldiers on the same side of a war.

It’s confusing, least of all because Panne finds that she _wants_ that attention.

 

One morning, she catches the blonde alone in the mess tent. The question is out of her mouth before Panne can think better of it. “Why are you so kind to me, Maribelle?”

“Is it Taguel custom to forgo a simple good-morning in exchange for questions such as that?” Maribelle asks, quirking a finely shaped eyebrow at her.

Panne shakes her head. “No, but I am curious.”

Maribelle’s smile softens into one that is kinder than it is teasing. “You’re rather interesting, you know. Fascinating, really.”

“Because I am the last of the Taguel?” Panne asks. If that is Maribelle’s reason, then this all makes more sense.

“No,” Maribelle says, confusing Panne once more. “I find you _fascinating_. Surely even the Taguel understand what I mean in saying that?” Panne’s ears twitch, and Maribelle’s hand mimics the motion even as her lips turn up into a smirk once more. “No? Well you’re very bright, Panne darling, you’ll figure it out soon enough.”

“I…I see.”

Maribelle sashays past, and this is the first time that Panne notices just how appealing the human’s purposefully coquettish gait can be. “And in the mean time, do feel free to continue your staring. I find it rude from others but from you? It’s rather endearing.” Maribelle’s words and her sultry tone affix themselves to Panne’s memory.

 

 

 

Later that night, Panne pays a visit to her closest human friend, asking “What does it _mean_?” as Cordelia sputters and blushes her way through an explanation.


	17. Helmet - Flavia x Sully

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Raising a child shouldn't be difficult for the East Khan and a hero of Ylisse...shouldn't, of course, being the operative word.

“I think we need to face facts, babe,” says her wife as they climb into bed.

“What is it?” She keeps her tone encouraging, conversationally soft—the way she remembers her mother doing for her father. Sully is always patient with her when it comes to matters of state, so really, it's the very least she could do.

"It's about Kjelle."

"Oh?" Whatever it is, Flavia isn’t too concerned; it's probably just something about Kjelle's training. "What's wrong?"

Sully growls in frustration before turning so that she and Flavia are eye to eye. “Our kid’s got the makings of a damn good warrior, but she’s pants at riding a horse.”

 

Secretly, Flavia’s a little relieved—the sight of her daughter atop a warhorse had been frightening the first time she’d seen it, and had not stopped being so even after multiple lessons.

 

Still, she knows why this discovery would prove so vexing for her wife. Horse-riding had meant a lot to Sully growing up; it had been a way for her to bond with her family and, when she became a cavalier, a way to feel close to them on long campaigns. Surely, she had meant to teach the skill to their daughter as a means of bonding. Flavia knows that it is upsetting, but if Kjelle lacks the talent, that is something that neither of them can control.

“She’s only a little girl yet, Sully,” says Flavia, curling more closely to her wife as the cold of the Feroxi winter settles over their room. The fire has only been alive a few minutes—it will be some time yet before they are warmed by its light. “Perhaps there will be improvement down the road. All warriors take some time to grow.”

“I know,” Sully says crossly, though she rolls into Flavia’s embrace, short hair tickling the underside of the East Khan’s chin. “I just…don’t want to worry about her too much, you know?”

“Well then maybe it is best that we take her down from her horse for now,” Flavia says, holding Sully to her chest. Her wife is always warm, and right now—as always—that is exactly what she needs even though the chill of her home country does not bother her any more.

“What do you mean?”

“I just mean that she’s so small…until I can procure a horse of a more suitable size I really would feel more comfortable if you at least put a helmet on the child’s head. We wouldn’t want her to crack her skull open, Sully.”

“Look at you, all maternal and worried,” Sully says, even though her eyes are shining with the same care that Flavia knows must be in hers. “But yeah, okay babe, I’ll make sure Kjelle wears a helmet for all of our training sessions.”

 

Flavia doesn’t want to ask why her wife hadn’t thought that a necessary requirement _before,_ so instead she allows Sully to surge upwards, catching her in a warm kiss.

 

 

 

The next day, though it is meant to be a day of rest, Sully details a new training plan to Kjelle, who listens even as her spoon dips in and out of her sweetened porridge. Flavia watches, amused as her wife tries to get their daughter interested in more than her morning’s meal, but it is of little use. Kjelle does not seem to have a favoured weapon yet—Sully wishes to push her towards the lance, Flavia, towards the sword—and so does not care one way or the other what she gets to train with.

 

Flavia excuses herself at about the halfway mark in Sully’s presentation, citing important matters of state as her reason.

 

It’s unfortunate that she should be missing so much of her daughter’s earliest days of training, but with Basilio off on a fantastical adventure on the Valmese continent Flavia finds herself swamped with work. She cannot wait for the big bald oaf’s return in a few weeks’ time. Until then, however, she is to deal with the problems of ruling so large a country on her own.

 

 

 

“Mama! Mama!’

The papers at her desk are promptly put down as Kjelle enters her study, and Flavia rises to take the child into her arms. She loves her daughter fiercely, and every time she sees the little one with her golden hair and her violet eyes, she is reminded that such joy would not have been possible without Sully. Well, without Sully and that potion, but mostly Sully.

“What is it, my little lioness?”

“Mother said you wanna make me wear helmet! Do I hafta?”

“Yes, you do _have to_ , little lioness” Flavia says, raising an eyebrow as her wife enters the study with a sheepish smile on her face.

“Well I wasn’t _sure_. I mean, I’ll be careful not to hit her head, obviously, babe.”

“Yeah, babe,” says Kjelle, parroting her mother. Flavia laughs and kisses her wife when Sully nears. In truth, she does not want them to leave, or if they do, she wants to come with them, but she can’t be there right now. She has a country to govern.

Kjelle tugs at the locks of hair that frame Flavia’s face. “Mama can’t watch me train today?”

“Not today, my darling, I am sorry…but how about this. You wear your helmet, and train very well, and the first day I’m free, you and I will spar.”

“Yeah?”

“Yes.”

“Yeah!” Kjelle says, hopping out of Flavia’s arms.

Sully and Flavia watch as the child run towards her room in search of a helmet. The East Khan thinks that Basilio _might_ have given her one, maybe, but before she can remember where it is, she's met with her wife's elbow in her side. “I love you, ya know, but did you really just promise our six-year-old she’d get to fight you if she trained?”

“…yes."

She had, hadn't she?

Sully laughs. “Well it’s a good thing she’s going to be wearing a helmet then.”


	18. Immediate - F!Morgan x Lucina

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lucina doesn't treat her the way she treats the others, and Morgan wonders why.

Ever since joining her father and the Shepherds, Morgan's made friends with the other time-displaced children, even formed some immediate bonds, but Lucina…

 

It isn’t that the princess is _mean_ to her or anything, but she isn’t _nice_ either.

 

She isn’t like this with anybody else. Isn’t silent and strange and almost _sad_. All of the others look up to Lucina, and in turn she supports all of them—except for Morgan. Though really that isn’t fair; she supports Morgan too. She’s just…stricter with Morgan, less warm, less willing to connect with her outside of sharing the burden of defending an entire new world from ruin. It’s like she’s trying to understand Morgan from far away, and she just can’t.

Eventually though, it becomes clear that Lucina doesn't _want_ to be watching Morgan so closely—though she does; she does it a lot—so Morgan takes it upon herself to seek Lucina out one evening.

 

They’ve just passed through the Valley of the Wyverns again, on their way to somewhere else, and now seems as good a time as any to ask Lucina what’s on her mind. She finds the princess seated by herself, sharpening some swords for other people to use. Falchion rests propped up on the log beside her, and Morgan takes a second to appreciate the glimmer of the holy weapon in the firelight. She takes another second to _really_ appreciate the way that Lucina’s hair glows—okay so maybe Morgan has a little bit of a tiny crush fueling her curiosity—before she clears her throat as delicately as she can. Lucina looks up, expression tensing slightly when she recognizes Morgan in the glow of the fire, but her voice is neutral enough when she speaks. “What is it, Morgan?”

“I…do you need any help, Lucina?”

“No, I think I’ll be well enough on my own. Haven’t you got somewhere to be? Someone to amuse?”

“Not really,” Morgan says, stinging from the clear rejection in the way that Lucina speaks. She decides that the best way to go about it is to just…go for it. “Lucina, is there a problem between us? Because I can’t remember—I mean of course there are things that I’m not remembering—but maybe something happened between us before we ended up in this timeline and…I just don’t like thinking that you’re angry with me.”

For a while all that Morgan can hear is the rhythmic scraping of whetstone against metal, and she turns to leave after it becomes clear that Lucina doesn’t wish to speak to her. She pauses only when she hears the princess’s breathing hitch, as if she is preparing to speak, and she turns, seeking out the familiarity of the Brand in the dimming firelight. Lucina seems to be looking straight through her when she says, “I’m sorry…I’ve been keeping you at arms’ length because…I just don’t understand why you and I aren’t like we were before.”

 

Morgan doesn’t ask for clarification.

 

She doesn’t feel that she needs to; that apology speaks for itself.

 

She’s forgetting something crucial about her relationship with Lucina, and it’s obviously painful for the princess…but why?

 

Morgan finds out a week later, after a skirmish with some Risen. Morgan has only recently been asked to become a sage, something that her mother suggests with more enthusiasm than Morgan is used to seeing from her, honestly, but she likes helping the Shepherds and the other soldiers who have joined the cause, so she doesn’t mind when her mother sticks her with a Heal staff and a Mend staff and tells her to get to work.

“Morgan? I’m sorry, I was expecting your brother…”

She looks Lucina up and down, surprised to find so many injuries. “No, it’s just me today. Come on in, I just finished up with everybody else.” Were it anybody else she would throw in a quip, something about her being cuter than her brother anyway, but she wouldn’t do that in front of Lucina, wouldn’t do that at all, really, because she loves her brother and he’s a great guy and looks aren’t everything no matter how much importance they hold for their mother (who cares about other things, of course, but who is appalled at the lack of effort both of her children seem to wish to put into their appearances).

“Thank you,” Lucina says, though her voice is just as stiff as her movements.

Morgan sets to work, knowing that she should probably heal the princess before getting into anything too personal. She can’t stop herself. “Lucina, about what you said last week…”

“Morgan, I’m…I can’t.” Lucina stares down at her hands, and she’s more embarrassed than Morgan has ever seen her. Morgan immediately feels badly, like there’s a pang in her heart that she doesn’t understand.

“I get it. I’m sorry…I shouldn’t have.” She sets to work on the other girl’s shoulder—it’s not looking well. “I just don’t understand what I’ve done…”

“No,” Lucina says, taking her hand. Morgan can’t help it but she smiles; it feels _right_. “ _I_ should have been better. I knew that you couldn’t remember things, but I was so angry and it showed in my treatment of you…I wanted—I just…I’d always hoped that when we found you, we’d be able to pick up where we left off.”

It clicks. “Oh. You and I…oh Lucina, I’m so sorry…”

“Don’t be sorry,” Lucina says, and when she looks up Morgan can see a tear forming in the corner of the branded eye. “I miss you.”

Morgan can’t stop herself from pulling the older girl into a hug. “I know this must be so frustrating for you, and I know it sucks that I can’t immediately up and remember everything…but we’re together now, right?”

Lucina sniffles into her shoulder and holds on tightly, like a child with a favourite stuffed-toy.

Morgan’s brain whispers, _we’ve been here before_.

 

She smiles.


	19. Late - Miriel x Lissa

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Of all the days to be late, Miriel chooses _today_ and Lissa is decidedly unimpressed.

Lissa is _this_ close to begging somebody for a quickening spell even though the traditions of House Ylisse demand that all births be as natural as possible. She just wants her wife to be here to hold her hand and ramble on and on about every little thing she can think of, honestly.  She’d thought that Miriel would be on time for this. After all, it’s a double-success for them, since they’d been able to conceive thanks to a potion Miriel had created herself.

 

She pouts at the midwife when she enters the room alone.

 

“Apologies, your highness,” says the woman, joviality making her seem younger than her fifty years would suggest. “The duchess has not responded to our summons. Sir Frederick has gone to find her.”

Lissa relaxes at that slightly—even if only slightly. She knows that Frederick will probably locate Miriel well before she gives birth to their child.

As if trying to be contrary, her body contracts rather painfully, and Lissa gasps despite herself. That had hurt _significantly_ more than all the other pains so far. The midwife smiles at her and shakes her head. “It would appear that the young prince or princess is rather determined!” The midwife stoops down to inspect the baby’s progress, and when she comes up she seems at once apologetic and rather excited. “Milady, I know that you would most likely prefer to wait for the duchess, but the baby is close to crowning…we had best begin.”

Lissa grits her teeth against another painful contraction and shakes her head. “I want my wife to be here.”

“I know that, your highness, but….”

Lissa can see in the woman’s eyes that _not_ doing as she says will definitely be harmful—whether for herself or the baby, she isn’t sure—and so she nods. “Okay. Tell me what to do.”

“Yes, your highness. Just follow my instructions, and we’ll have this baby out as soon as we can.” She steps out into the hallway briefly, calling in a team of healers, and Lissa is surprised at all the fuss that’s being raised for her sake. She hears her brother’s nervous voice out in the hallway, as well as her niece’s childish babble, and she can’t help but snort out a laugh. Chrom seems to think that his sister is too fragile to deliver a baby, which is ridiculous because Lissa is hardier than his _wife_ , who is pregnant with their second child, but whatever.

_Where is Miriel?_

 

Lissa tries very hard to concentrate on the midwife’s pleasant voice, but the pain, and the fact that her wife is missing from this moment, make her feel slightly more agitated than usual. She stares down at the large mound of stomach that has been her daily greeting for the last few months. “Here we go, sweetheart.”

 

 

 

 

 

The door bursts open just as the baby’s first wails can be heard, and Lissa knows as soon as a cool hand reaches for hers that Miriel has arrived. She almost doesn’t open her eyes to greet the other woman, out of sheer exhaustion. She's glad when she does. Miriel is beautiful when she’s like this, distraught with love and dishevelled with worry, hat missing and spectacles askew

Miriel’s normally calm voice fluctuates with emotion as she and the midwife start speaking rapidly about the birthing process and the current condition of the baby and all sorts of medical things that Lissa _knows_ Miriel has been studying precisely for this moment. Lissa is just happy that her wife is here now, even though she _technically_ missed the moment their child came into the world.

“How are you feeling?” Miriel asks, gently stroking the side of her face lovingly even though Lissa feels that she must look atrocious. She’s still sweating, still straining even though the moment is mostly over and her baby is being cleaned up. Miriel kisses her hand. “The rigours of delivering a baby are said to affect every woman differently and I need to know if you are feeling any sort of pain or discomfort outside of the—

“Honey, please, shut _up_. I just pushed what essentially is a _watermelon_ out of my body.”

Miriel laughs, and Lissa is pleased with how her wife is right now—unguarded and starting to feel the same joy that she’s felt ever since pushing their son screaming out into their beautiful world. When the redhead turns towards her boy—their boy—the smile on her face is warm and proud. “He’s too handsome to be compared to a watermelon, Lissa.”

“Is he? Let me see him!”

The midwife places the newborn in Lissa’s arms, and Lissa immediately thinks that all this pain was worth it. Their boy is beautiful, and completely worth every experience—good and bad—that they’ve been through together leading up to this moment. A tuft of hair sprouts from his tiny head—a match for Miriel’s—and Lissa coos at him as he looks up at her with eyes that will probably end up being pale blue, like hers. He’s got Miriel’s nose and Lissa’s smile and overall, he’s perfect.

“His name is Owain,” she says, knowing her wife will not object.

Miriel stands over them protectively, one hand on Lissa’s shoulder, the other on their son’s head. “Hello Owain,” she says. “I hope you don’t mind that I was late, dear boy…I can’t promise I won’t be late for something again in the future, either.”

“Your mother gets distracted easily, sweetheart,” Lissa coos, looking up at Miriel with a fond smile, “But we love her, and she loves us, and that’s all that matters.”

Miriel nods and smiles at this, though in a second her mouth is moving in a speech that Lissa isn’t certain is defensive or explanatory or both. “Of course, in future I will try my best to be as punctual as I can be given the—

“Honey? Don’t ruin the moment.”

“Of course, my love. My apologies.”


	20. Masochist - Aversa x Phila

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Aversa doesn't know what she wants to feel anymore.

Aversa doesn’t need to feel pain to get off, but does she _like_ when there’s an element of pain?

Yes.

Physical pain during sex is pedestrian, and in some ways, she thinks that it’s mostly unsatisfying. _Emotional_ pain, however, now _that_ would be intriguing. Aversa isn’t sure where she’d find a partner who could cause her emotional pain, but she wonders what it would feel like.

She knows that perhaps hers isn’t the healthiest mindset, and she’s not sure if there’s anybody who she can really trust to explain it to, so she says nothing, and keeps her head down, and helps the Shepherds to win the war on Grima. When it's over, when the one person she still felt some connection to vanishes from the world, Aversa disappears.

 

She returns to what had once been her village. Other people have settled into the space, and though they are quiet at first, scared of her, they eventually grow to accept her as one of their own. Aversa misses the days when she’d been a feared sorceress, but honestly, living this way feels…nice. Like she could have been _happy_ doing nothing but this.

Aversa wonders if she’ll ever truly be happy.

She takes a lover or two, always outsiders; Aversa does not care who they are as long as they can manage, even if only for the one night they are with her, to make her feel _something_. Often, she asks to be handled roughly, to be hit or bitten or burned, and often, the outsider obliges.

 

Until the woman with eyes like wine and hair like the froth of waterfalls comes.

 

Aversa knows her from somewhere, she thinks as she guides the woman to her bed. She knows these eyes and this voice and this hair. Knows this body even though it is clothed in little more than a standard, ugly traveller’s robe and a simple tunic underneath. It strikes her at about the same time that it strikes the outsider, and Aversa almost wants to make a joke out of it.

Imagine, they’re both naked, Aversa can _feel_ wetness rubbing against her thigh, and yet she and this not-so-stranger are suspended in this moment, staring at each other. Unable to put this revelation aside.

She finds her voice first. “I’d thought you dead a long time ago, Captain.”

“And I’d heard that you came back to life, sorceress.” There is no malice in the woman’s voice, a voice that Aversa remembers hearing during a rather different sort of death than the one she’d had planned for the evening.

She stifles the urge to giggle at her own wit. “Well?”

“Well what?” asks the woman—Phila, she thinks the name was.

“This is your chance, Captain,” she says, voice slipping into the dark tones that she has not had occasion to use in _so_ long a while. “Avenge yourself against me, if you wish it. I will not resist.”

 

She hopes that Phila can’t feel the way her body shivers with anticipation at the thought.

 

“No, I don’t think I will,” Phila says, taking her by surprise. “You are much changed, Aversa.”

“And what will you do now?” she asks, not wanting to seem eager, but needing to know all the same.

Phila grins before nudging Aversa’s legs apart with her knee. “Now? Now, I think I’ll finish what I’ve started.”

 

 

 

While she cannot lie, and say that she does not enjoy the experience, Aversa feels slightly cheated when the morning comes. She can’t explain why. Perhaps she’d been expecting Phila to be rougher, to treat her poorly. Instead, the ex-Pegasus Knight Captain had been rather doting; a completely unselfish lover—the kind of lover that Aversa can say, with confidence, that she has never had.

She’s further surprised by the fact that Phila returns to her hut the next night. And then the next. Each time just as sweetly, as mildly as the first. Aversa does not know why she feels so strange about the whole thing, but she grows accustomed to it.

 

 

 

Slowly, she begins to fall in love.

She thinks that Phila is falling too.

The experience is pleasant, but ultimately short-lived.

 

 

 

They never kiss, partially because Aversa does not do that and partially because Phila has never attempted it. Still, Phila comes dangerously close, bringing her face up to Aversa’s each night before thinking better of it and changing her focus to Aversa’s neck. She has a fascination, it seems, with Aversa’s hair, and how it glows almost golden in the candlelight.

 Aversa does not think anything amiss with that, and she amuses herself with tracing patterns over Phila’s smooth skin as the other woman takes her time with her body. It’s on a night like any other, in a moment like this, that she hears it. Hears the whimpering of a name that isn’t hers.

 _Emmeryn_.

The realization hits her immediately. This has never been about _her,_ but a woman for whom she could never play a decent stand-in _._ Aversa wants to laugh. In some ways, Phila is more messed up than she is, pining after a woman who doesn’t want her—and Emmeryn _doesn’t_ want Phila that way, since last Aversa had heard, she’d been up in Ylisstol celebrating the return of everyone’s beloved Robin; Emmeryn’s own beloved spouse.

 

She laughs deeply, letting the sound rumble over her chest, and does not give clarification when Phila pulls away to look at her askance.

 

So, the woman she’s begun to love is in love with somebody else?

Is merely using her body as a substitute in place of the unattainable?

How _pathetic_.

It’s humiliating, really, but…Aversa thinks it isn’t so bad. Phila’s mouth travels down her heated skin, biting, licking.

She could make use of this. This pain. This humiliation. It may not be intentional, but it hurts all the same. It hurts so _badly_.

 

 

 

She doesn’t _need_ pain to get off, not really, but this…this is far too _delicious_ to waste.


	21. Priority - Tharja x Cordelia (Part Four)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Her life now is beautiful, but Tharja can't help but feel insecure

Cordelia’s love has spoiled her and while Tharja is grateful, she cannot help but feel greedy when she asks for just a little more of the other woman’s time.

 

That feeling never lasts long, of course, because Cordelia insists that her family will always be her priority. Sometimes it’s easy to forget that, though, what with the demands of her wife’s profession pulling the pegasus knight away from Tharja and their daughters at nearly every turn. Cordelia helps whenever she is able, of course, and she puts the children to bed each night, but Tharja handles most things on her own. She’s surprisingly good at it, but that doesn’t mean that she likes feeling as if she’s raising their children by herself.

The fact that there are _two_ of them is another issue, entirely.

 

It’s one thing to meet one’s grown daughters and hear that they were born twins, and another thing entirely to be living the experience from the start. Tharja…can’t say that she _hates_ it, but she doesn’t love it either. New motherhood is messy and irritatingly loud, but her newborns are wonderful and sweet and significantly better looking than most of the other squishy-looking things that her fellow Shepherds have been popping out, so that, at least, is nice for Tharja.

Her parents-in-law treat her like a person now that she’s given birth to two new members of their line, which is also a pleasant change; though Tharja still talks rather rudely—and loudly—to any member of the household staff who uses the word _Plegian_ around her children as if it is a dirty thing, as if half of her daughters’ heritage were a curse.

 

Sometimes she catches a servant giving her a dirty look and muttering, and while none of the staff would ever dare disrespect Tharja in Cordelia’s presence, Cordelia’s presence has been…lacking, as of late. On top of that, Tharja has begun to feel restless, has begun to feel ill at ease even though technically, things now are what she had secretly hoped they could have been from the beginning.

 

It would be easier, Tharja thinks, if she could blame her wife for this sudden upset to her usual equilibrium. To blame Cordelia though…well, Tharja doesn’t think that would be fair, considering how hard her wife works for their sake. Besides, what could the redhead be blamed for? For not caring enough? For not loving her or their children enough?

Ugh. Tharja dislikes even thinking this way—she sounds like a spoiled Ylissean housewife, and she hates these thoughts because they are untrue. Cordelia cares more than enough. Loves more than Tharja had ever thought she could deserve. Sees the children as the sun and moon and stars.

 

The problem isn’t Cordelia.

 

The problem isn’t anything that Tharja can blame on anyone else, really; she can’t blame her children, young and guiltless and _perfect_ as they are. She can’t blame her parents-in-law, who have mellowed more than she would have thought possible. She can’t even blame the ruder members of the household staff—truthfully, she isn’t bothered by a handful of derisive whispers. So really, that means that the only person Tharja can blame for her state of malcontent…is herself.

 

She wants to feel like she’s the centre of Cordelia’s world, the way she had been during the war, during the dark days when neither of them could have said with any confidence if they’d live to see things through.

 

Which, if she’s being honest with herself, make sense. After all, does she not spend the entirety of her existence in a country whose upper class—to which she almost regrettably belongs—scorns her very existence, and all that her heritage stands for? Anybody would feel unsettled in their own skin, living the way that she does. Anybody would want to be reassured of their place as their lover’s everything. Or at least, Tharja thinks that makes sense. She’s still not very good at what other people think is _normal_ romance.

She doesn’t plan to bring this up with her wife at all, but Cordelia is as perceptive as always, especially when it comes to her. One night, she calls Tharja out on her behaviour.

 

“My love, you have been upset lately,” Cordelia says, cradling Noire in her arms. “Has somebody said something? Have I done something to upset you?”

Tharja is quick to shake her head, careful not to jostle Severa. “I’ve…” She cannot say that she’s been feeling lonely. That’s so very _unlike_ her that Cordelia would surely leave her, disgusted, perhaps, by the clingy creature that her once-independent wife has become.

“You’ve…what?” Cordelia places Noire in her bassinet slowly, pausing to kiss the child’s deep red locks. “What is the matter?”

Tharja doesn’t want to say it, but it comes out as she lays Severa down, stroking silky black hair. “You’re never home.”

Cordelia is immediately at her side, running her hands along Tharja’s arms. “I know, and I apologize, but the safety of the halidom…”

“Is more important than your own family. I understand.” She wants to slap a hand over her mouth, but honestly Tharja is just surprised that she would speak so bitterly to the woman who has given her everything. She’s about to apologize when Cordelia kisses her, slowly, sweetly, in the way that makes her feel that she means _everything_ to the other woman.

“I didn’t realize that you felt that way, Tharja,” Cordelia says against her lips, pulling away to look her in the eyes. “But that is not true at all. I protect the halidom for your sake, yours and our daughters’.”

“That’s…noble…but we would also like to see you, you know.”

“I know,” Cordelia says, pulling Tharja in to her chest in the protective way that Tharja adores. “And I will try to be better about managing my time. You and our children are my priority, always. Never forget that, Tharja.”

“I’ll try not to.”


	22. Racy - Sumia x Cherche

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cherche would have never suspected _Sumia_ of all people to read such racy things...but that's perfectly fine.

And here she’d thought that the Shepherds were all straight-laced, and boring…

 _On Wings of Passion_  is _certainly_ not a novel for such a demographic.

Cherche herself has read this particular bit of prose—perhaps a few more times than she’d freely admit—but she’s not sure that she'd be able to keep an even expression on her face knowing that there was another person in the room. Sumia, however, looks completely at ease—as if the book in her hands were little more than a manual on the proper care of pegasi, or something.

Perhaps she has yet to register Cherche’s presence, absorbed as she is in her reading, or perhaps the thought of being caught with such suggestive material does not strike fear into her heart. Perhaps, Cherche thinks as she toys with her options, perhaps Sumia is secretly thrilled at the possibility of being caught.

Wouldn’t that be fun?

The wyvern rider inches closer, not really into Sumia’s space, and waves her hand back and forth. If Sumia is paying any mind to her at all, she’ll notice.

 

The response is a resounding…nothing. Just a flip of the page as Sumia continues to read. Engrossed. This, Cherche thinks, is the perfect opportunity. She takes a moment to look the pegasus knight up and down, feeling slightly deplorable but also knowing that it would be madness _not_ to be attracted to the woman standing in front of her.

Cherche can’t help herself; it’s been a while since she had fun of this variety.

“My, my, what intriguing literature you do indulge in, Lady Sumia.”

The response is immediate, as Sumia whips around, catching Cherche in the face with her ash-brown locks. The book in her hands is slammed shut and held behind her back, and her cheeks, which had already been rather pink, are now so bright that Cherche feels warmer just looking at them.

“L-lady C-Cherche!”

She has to laugh just a bit at that—Sumia is rather cute, all flustered like this, and Cherche wonders how this can be the same woman who’d eyed her so shamelessly during their first meeting. “Please, just call me Cherche. What were you reading?”

“C-call me Sumia,” says the pegasus knight, cheeks still burning. “I…er…you see, it—

“You know, Sumia, I find it refreshing that a young woman such as yourself should be so bold and unapologetic about your choice in reading material. Truly, it warms me to think that we’ve come far enough as a society that a woman of breeding, like yourself, should feel so comfortable indulging in fantasies like these in a public space.” Cherche allows her voice to drawl as she speaks, hoping that the teasing will not be enough to dissuade Sumia from her company just yet.

When it becomes clear that the pegasus knight has no intentions of leaving so soon, she chances a step forward.

Sumia only flushes even harder, turning nearly purple. “I-I…young women like myself?” She pauses and looks Cherche over, in a way that the rose-haired woman thinks _might_ have been appraising. _Interesting_. “S-surely you don’t mean that you’re that much older than I?”

It’s the stutter that gives away an otherwise masterful deflection, and Cherche stifles a giggle behind one hand, careful to keep her eyes level with Sumia’s. Oh, she rather _likes_ this little lady—rather likes the adorable flush on her face, and the softness of her ash-brown hair, and the fact that underneath this beautifully nervous, sugary-sweet exterior there must be—there absolutely _must_ be—a rather…adventurous young woman.

Cherche wonders if Sumia doesn’t _already_ have any sordid experiences under her belt.

She wonders if Sumia would like her help in that arena.

“You flatter me, Sumia, but I am _considerably_ older than _you_ , at the very least. I heard tell that you were but a newly-bloomed flower of nineteen. Is that so?”

Sumia stutters, twisting a curl of hair around her finger. _On Wings of Passion_ remains in her other hand, though it’s held as far away from Sumia’s body as possible, as if she’s trying to distance herself from the book. Her eyes dart around the room, never settling on Cherche’s for too long. “My twentieth birthday will not be until November, so you are correct, yes.” Cherche is about to say something else when Sumia takes in a deep breath and faces her fully, the colour in her cheeks paling (if only slightly). “I don’t believe that you could be so old, Cherche.”

“Perhaps you are right. I have seen twenty-four summers, thus far, however, and am approaching my twenty-fifth.”

“Five years isn’t that much of a difference,” Sumia says, and it sounds, strangely enough, as if she’s trying to convince herself of something.

Cherche laughs in agreement. “Only enough of a difference in terms of what I’ve managed to pick up along the way.”

“I-I can imagine…” Sumia says, drifting, before her eyes snap up to Cherche’s and she says, “I…I’ve only ever read…I don’t…”

Cherche takes another step, this time directly into the pegasus knight’s space, and Sumia’s breathing hitches in the most _adorable_ fashion. Cherche feels that she deserves a reward, though she resists her sudden desire to back the smaller woman against the wall and ravish her while standing. That, she thinks, might be a touch _too_ forward, and she isn’t doing this for the sake of a quick romp in the barracks.

 

She settles, instead, for nipping lightly along Sumia’s jaw, eliciting a little mewl out of the pegasus knight that’s simply too precious to have been practiced.

 

Cherche traces the length of Sumia’s jaw with her fingertips once she’s finished, revelling in the little shivers that the pegasus knight makes. When Sumia’s doe-eyes flash up to hers, she responds by pressing in as closely to the shorter woman as she can. “Well, if you’d ever like to put what you’ve read into practice…you know where to find me, Sumia.”


	23. Subtle - Cynthia x Noire

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So maybe Cynthia is about as subtle as a thunderstorm...so what? Subtle is a job for other people.

By the time Cynthia is fifteen it’s clear to her that she thinks girls are wonderful in the way that she’s supposed to think boys are wonderful. Cynthia doesn’t want to fall in love with a _boy_ when there are so many girls out there who’d surely like for her to be their personal hero.

 

Surprisingly, the first person that she tells is Noire. It happens mostly on accident, because she hadn’t meant to find Noire hiding in the barracks but she’d done just that, and she’d just been bursting with the news.

“I like girls!”

Noire’s immediate reaction is to stare at her,confused, but realization hits eventually. Cynthia is pleased to receive a smile from her friend instead of a rebuke. “Oh, that’s nice.”

“Aren’t you surprised?”

Noire smiles again and it’s slightly apologetic in nature. “I mean…no? You’re not a…subtle person, Cynthia.”

“Okay,” she says, because it’s true, she’s not subtle about _anything._ Why be subtle when you can be _fabulous_?

“Are you going to tell your parents?”

Cynthia grabs the chair beside Noire as she thinks of what to say. Ylisseans aren’t too bad about homosexual relationships, as far as she knows, and neither are Plegians, but she doesn’t know if she’s ready to tell her parents. She wants to. They’d probably not be bothered—especially not her mother, who’s a romantic and mostly just cares about love in general. She asks Noire for advice, and waits patiently as the older girl twirls a strand of hair around her fingers in thought.

“I think you should go for it,” says Noire, and there’s a tremor in her voice that Cynthia can’t place. Still, she agrees that that would be for the best, and when she thanks Noire she thinks that she can see a small smile on the girl’s lips.

 

 

 

She tells her mother her newfound identity in the most fabulous way she possibly can—by painting a banner and flying with it on a day when she’s sure her mother will be out in the garden. Her father sees it before she manages to take it out to the stables, and all he does is smile and say, “Figured it out years ago. You’re not exactly _subtle_.” At her pout, he ruffles her hair and adds, “Good for you, kiddo. I love you.”

He even helps her get all settled on her mother’s pegasus before taking off, tucking the banner in so that it won’t fly away unless she lets go of it.

 

As expected, Cynthia is rewarded with her mother’s laughter when Sumia spots the banner and makes out the words, and rewarded further with a warm, “I love you, sweetheart, no matter who you are” upon touching back down to earth. By that point, the banner is ruined, but Cynthia doesn’t care, because she has the best parents in the world.

She’s also lucky enough to have been born into friendships with some of the prettiest girls in the whole world, and that’s something to celebrate too.

 

 

 

When she’s fifteen, she kisses Severa behind the stables while they’re supposed to be getting ready for a training drill. To her surprise, she doesn’t get pushed off right away, but when Severa backs off her there’s a look of…something in the other girl’s eyes, and Cynthia knows that this isn’t the girl for her. Which, now that she thinks about it, is sort of a shame, because there’s just something so _poetic_ about once-enemies, turned friends, turned lovers.

She doesn’t even really need to _ask_ Severa why this isn’t something she wants, because the twin-tailed girl tells her herself. “Sorry, Cynthia,” Severa says, patting her shoulder in her awkward Severa way. “There’s somebody else.”

Cynthia only nods and smiles and says it isn’t a big deal, because it isn’t.

That doesn’t mean that she isn’t just a little bit jealous when she sees Severa walking together with Kjelle after the drill is over. A lot of it stems from her confusion at how she’d missed the connection between the two of them, because they’re like this _all the time_. She’s mostly just embarrassed, even though not even Severa would make fun of her for something like this.

Cynthia doesn’t hold on to her embarrassment for long though, because Severa and Kjelle make a cute couple, and they’re her friends, so mostly she’s just happy for them. She’s also lucky she has Noire to lean on; the older girl (who, once Cynthia really gets to know her, is way more fun than any of them had ever thought) is a fantastic source of support.

 

 

 

When she’s seventeen, Noire surprises her by asking if they might "take a chance".

That is to say, she’s surprised but completely enamoured with the idea, because Noire has always been there for her, and Noire is this beautiful, wonderful person underneath the strangeness of her talisman. Honestly Cynthia isn’t sure how she’d missed it—“It’s because I’m _subtle_ ”—but their joy is short-lived due to the increasing aggression of Grima and his Risen.

Soon there’s no time to be thinking about anything other than training and revenge, because everybody’s parents are dead and Lucina is burdened with Falchion’s weight, and _what’s the point_ anymore?

“The point,” Noire tells her one night as she’s cleaning both their wounds, “is that we have to keep on fighting for something. We have to _believe_ that we’re fighting for something, so we may as well fight for ourselves and each other and the future.”

To say that she’s stunned would be an understatement, because in all honesty Cynthia has always thought her girlfriend to be more fatalistic of view. “Wow, I didn’t know you thought like a hero too, Noire!”

Noire smiles into the way that Cynthia hugs her, and when they’re face to face again she laughs, and it’s the most pleasant sound Cynthia has heard in days. Weeks. Months. “I do, yes…I’m just subtler about it than you are.”


	24. United - Lissa x Nowi

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lissa worries about a lot of things, these days, but there are some worries that shouldn't even exist.

Right before they walk into the grand hall side by side Nowi stops her, placing small hands on either side of her face so that she cannot look away.

 “I want to promise you that when we walk in there, I’ll be right by your side, and I won’t be afraid no matter how meanly the council looks at us, because I love you and we’re united and that’s what matters, okay?”

Lissa can only smile and kiss her wife’s delicate nose, because she’d thought that that would go without saying. Nowi’s very cute, she thinks. “Okay,” she says again, because she knows that Nowi needs a little confirmation, and she’s more than happy to give it.

 _United, huh_?

She likes the sound of that.

 

They’re united when they walk into the grand hall.

 

They’re united when it’s announced that her brother means to enter into war once again, this time against Valm.

 

They’re united when Lucina arrives from the future, bringing with her news that other children are supposed to appear as well.

 

They’re _supposed_ to be united when Robin and Chrom come home with a half-manakete girl named Nah, but something in Lissa balks at that.

She knows that she and her wife are bound to end up discussing it sooner rather than later, but still, Lissa does her best to avoid it. Does her best to avoid a discussion they should have had after passing through the Sage’s Hamlet. Lissa cringes even though she’s alone in the medic tent—the word _discussion_ has just never sat well with her.

She does her best to look carefree, because Nowi is probably close by.

Nowi always knows where to find her.

“There you are! See, Owain, Nah! I always know where to find your mama!” Nowi practically flies into Lissa’s arms as the last words leave her mouth. Lissa can’t stop herself from laughing when the manakete leans up to kiss her nose.

Owain steps into the medic tent next, bringing his sister along with him. His hair—pale green and oddly spiked, as usual—seems to glow for a moment before the tent flap closes and it returns to its regular shade. “So you did, fair dragon-mother mine! So you did indeed. And how fares my exalted mother on this fine day? How many lives, touched by your fair hands, have been pulled from the very brink of death on this day?”

“Owain, shut up,” says Nah as she ducks into the tent under her brother’s arm. She’s smiling her curious little smile though; which Lissa takes to mean that this is just how she’s used to acting where her brother is concerned—Lissa can’t say she blames anyone for letting that be the case. “Mama, we’ve been looking for you everywhere!”

Lissa is about to offer an apology when Owain starts up again, running a hand through his hair and gesturing wildly with his hands. “My sister, draconic though her temper may be, is right, fairest mother, for we have se—

“Owain. Shut up.”

“Nah! Be nicer to your brother!” Nowi’s smile—the same radiant, strangely mature smile that had won Lissa over on day one—quiets a little when she catches Lissa’s eyes, but the strangeness is gone quickly enough even though the manakete immediately begins shoving their children back out of the medic tent. “You two go and…practice in your dragon forms, or something, okay? Owain, be careful that Nah doesn’t burn anything down this time! And Nah, make sure your brother doesn’t get it into his head to try to handle a Wyrmslayer again…okay?”

Twin cries of “Yes, mom!” echo throughout the camp and Lissa can just make out the shapes of her children’s dragon forms taking off above the tent. She doesn’t have much time to worry about them, however, because soon enough her wife is in her face again, sitting her down at the edge of a cot that Lissa is pretty sure hasn’t been cleaned in a while.

“Now.” Nowi’s grip on her hand is warm, like always, even though her face is very, very serious. “You’ve been avoiding me lately, Lissa.”

She doesn’t have any excuses, really, so she just comes right out with it and says, “Nowi, I’m scared.”

“Of what?”

“We have _kids_ Nowi. Two of them.”

Nowi smiles brightly again, and Lissa’s heart lifts. Her wife is just precious, honestly. “We do! And they’re _great_ , don’t you think so? They’re the best half-manaketes a parent could ask for!”

“They’re the best, really, Nowi, and I love them—and you—but I…”

“What’s wrong?”

Lissa doesn’t know what to say because honestly, she’s never even thought of whether she and Nowi could have children, and this is honestly a miracle, but there’s something…nagging at her. She’s afraid—for their sakes, mostly—because it’s one thing that she’s married a manakete, but now that it’s proven that she and Nowi will have kids, how will the council react to finding out that two potential heirs to House Ylisse are half-manakete?

“Is that what’s worrying you? How the council will react?” Nowi reaches up to take Lissa’s face in her hands again, and the blonde realizes that she’s spoken aloud.

“I’m being stupid, I know—

“No, you’re not,” Nowi says, and her hand is so warm that Lissa lets herself sink into the touch. “You’re concerned for your family, and that’s alright, because I am too…but do you remember what I told you, right before we walked into the grand hall that first time?”

 

Lissa nods, because of _course_ she remembers that.

 

“Well, I stand by that even now. It’s us against the world, Lissa, and when our kids come along in this timeline, we’ll be together to keep them safe. United, remember?”

Lissa nods and kisses Nowi once, for being sweet, and another time because she loves her, and because she’s been worrying over nothing—as usual. “United, huh?”

She likes the sound of that.

 


	25. Wail - F!Robin x Severa

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And even in victory, there can be sorrow; such is a lesson the Shepherds have learned over, and over, and over again.

She’s cold, so cold, and it feels like something is wrong, but it can’t be. This is what she was meant to do, right? This is her life’s purpose. This is what she was always meant for, saving the world from Grima by offering up every last inch of herself. Her death is fulfilling; her death has meaning.

Robin knows that she should be glad for this, but the only thing that she can feel aside from a small surge of accomplishment is…cold.

 

And then there is sudden warmth.

 

“You…you _idiot_! _You promised me, Robin!_ You told me that we would find another way!” Of course Severa would be at her side in her final moments.

Robin is being pulled down, down into familiar arms, no longer floating slightly over the Fell Dragon’s back. Long hair covers what little her eyes can see, and she is warm now, almost too warm. She wonders how much time she has like this, before her soul is taken away.

Death is calling her.

She hears it.

“Severa…” Speaking the name of the woman she loves…it hurts. She can’t look at Severa though, because if she does...if she does, surely that will hurt her even more. Surely it will hurt them both. “I love you, Severa.”

“Shut up! You—you lied to me!”

“Severa, sweetheart, that’s enough of the hysterics, please…” Robin turns to see Cordelia, to see her best-friend-turned-mother-in-law, and she almost regrets it. Almost. Because Cordelia has been in pain before, has lost her family—all those sisters—before…and now Robin is taking family away from her friend once again. Still, if Cordelia has come to this realization as well—which Robin is certain she has—then she does not show her grief. Instead she kneels at her daughter’s side, pressing one battle-warmed hand to Robin’s brow. “I’m proud of you, Robin,” she says, and Robin feels that she does not deserve such pride.

 _But Cordy,_ she wants to say, _but Cordy, I did the one thing I promised you that I would never do…I made your daughter cry, Cordelia._

If Cordelia senses the words behind Robin’s tears—dying is less painful than this—then she does not show that either, though she does stand to give her daughter and her best friend a moment. She turns away, and Robin can see her son ducking into the woman’s embrace.

She smiles.

 

She’s glad.

 

A hiccup sounds, and then there are familiar lips pressing to her own, pulling away, pressing to her cheeks, her forehead, her nose. “I love y-you,” says Severa, and it takes Robin a minute to realize that her wife is sobbing as she holds her, sobbing as Robin slips away second by second.

She can’t stay.

Gods, how badly she wants to say.

“You’re going to be just fine,” Robin says, reaching up to touch Severa’s face one last time. Everything that she does in the next few seconds is going to be done _one last time_ , she notes, and it would be amusing, in some way, were it not happening to her at this very moment. Were she not dying a hero’s reluctant, but necessary death here, atop the back of a dragon that should no longer be flying, in the arms of a woman she was never supposed to know the way she knows her now.

“You can’t say that to me now, i-idiot,” Severa says, and she’s sobbing so hard that Robin can feel every rise and fall of her chest. “You don’t know that.”

“I do, because I know you.” She waits, then thinks better of it, and says what’s on her mind now that she’s dying. “I love you.”

She wonders if death is this kind to others who die in the arms of their lover…it feels like she’s been given so much time. So many words. Not that she’s been given either of those things.

It just feels like it.

“S-stop saying that!”

“But it’s true. And I want the last words I say to be something truthful. I love you.”

Robin almost wants to laugh at herself, at how corny she sounds—were this any other day, Severa wouldn’t even look at her, let alone hold her like this. But this isn’t any other day. This is the last day she’s ever going to get to be a sap with her wife, so if this is all she has…

Cordelia takes one last look at her and tenses, and Robin knows she’s only got a minute or so left. Precious little time to say everything that she needs to say. Morgan rushes over to where his mothers are huddled, launching himself at Severa, who—for once—doesn’t chastise her son for his loving carelessness.

“Morgan, I love you and your mother very much,” she says.

Severa holds her closer, pulling Morgan in with one arm and saying, “Morgan, your mother is being a moron—tell her she’s going to be okay.”

“I c-can’t, Mom,” says their son, and Robin is sorry that she won’t get to watch him grow as a tactician, as a young man, anymore. She’s sorry that she’s leaving them behind like this; sorry that she’s leaving Morgan without a mother, leaving Severa a widow at the age of eighteen. She’s sorry for dying.

 

But she can’t be, because she loves them, and she’s dying for _them_.

 

The breath stops coming to her so easily, and now she’s wheezing out “I love you’s” and trying her damnedest to stay alive for one more second, one more glimpse. “I’ll come back to you.”

Severa’s eyes go wide just as hers flutter shut, and Robin feels guilty.

She’d never wanted to lie.

 

 

 

It’s a strange feeling, her body dematerializing into nothingness, but she feels it. She hears the anguished cries that fill the air as she disappears. Her ears strain for Severa’s voice, and she dies broken-hearted when she hears it.

 

 

A plaintive wail.


	26. Zoo - Nah x F!Morgan

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What Nah needs isn't more sleep. What she needs is understanding.

There’s something about cages that frightens her; and Nah thinks back to long, lonely nights, locked up like an animal, and finds every reason why. It’s a very private fear, the kind of thing that she doesn’t talk about with anybody else, especially not now. In this peaceful time, such fears are unfounded.

 

Such demons need not come to frolic freely about her head at all hours.

 

Still, some nights, they do.

 

At first, Nah thinks that it is because she has yet to let go of her past. She still remembers the painful words, the nights spent hungry, the bars of a cell she had never rightfully deserved, and she shudders and gasps awake against the weight of such memories. When she calms, she remembers that she has weathered those storms and come out alive, and she can sleep once again.

Later, she thinks, perhaps, that she is still lonely underneath it all, struggling to find a place of belonging in this free new world. She wonders why she should stay here, so close to her parents’ home, while most of the others run wild across the continent. Perhaps she is alone? But no, Nah shakes her head at her thought, because she could never be alone in this world. She has her parents. She has her friends. She has her love.

She turns to Morgan, who sleeps always only with their fingers intertwined, and she knows that this cannot be anything but true.

She runs out of reasons more quickly than she can think up new ones, and so it goes until the day comes that Nah runs out of reasons for her nightly tortures entirely. Still, the nightmares persist, and the fear of cages grows only ever more sharp, ever more distinct, until Nah is terrified senseless most days, when she has no reason to be.

They have won the future. There is nothing else to fear. She has love in this world, and it is beautiful and comes from all places. And yet. She cannot help but feel that there is something wrong. At the very least, she feels that there is something wrong with _her_.

She does not say a word, and for a while, life continues as normal.

 

Until the day that a travelling troupe comes to Ylisstol.

 

She hears about it, as she hears about most things of a frivolous nature, from Morgan. “Father says that there’s some sort of spectacle come down from Ferox! Wanna go see it with me?”

“Sure! When did you want to go?”

“Uh…is now okay? We can go as soon as you’re dressed!

Nah laughs—it doesn’t feel so forced when it’s for Morgan—and let’s the other girl plant kisses on both her cheeks before she insists on shooing her partner from the room. She’ll be ready more quickly without Morgan around to make outfit suggestions.

Throwing on a simple dress, she turns to herself in the mirror, hoping that the dark circles under her eyes only look so bad due to the harsh sunlight coming in from the window. Nah sighs at her reflection before practicing her smile. Once. Twice. By the third time, it looks suitably cheerful, and so she grabs joins Morgan in main hall of their home before they step out into the street. They walk stuck to each other’s sides, hands clasped together, and Nah thinks that this will be a good day.

 

 

When they stop in front of a group of caravans with barred bodies and creatures stuck behind said bars, she is forced to think that she may have been mistaken.

 

 

The sounds of the animals are piteous as men and women walk from caravan to caravan. Nah knows that she is shaking, can see that Morgan is concerned, but she is frozen. It feels distinctly as though she is living through one of her own nightmares, and Nah bites her lip until the taste of iron fills her mouth.

“W-what is this?” She asks.

A man with a large moustache and a slicked-down hairdo sees them, and he walks up to them with a stride that is all purpose and pomp. “Hello little ladies, you must be locals! My compatriots and I are just setting up.”

“Are you a circus troupe or…?” Morgan asks, tone friendly, though her arm slides around Nah’s body, pulling them more tightly together.

“A circus? No my dear, we’re a travelling, completely mobile zoo! A…menagerie, of sorts!”

Menagerie.

_Menagerie._

 

Nah remembers that word, remembers thinking it beautiful, remembers _hating_ it because it had always been delivered to her in the form of “Send her to a menagerie, we’ve no room for animals here.” She grabs for Morgan, urges her to take them away, and Morgan is all too willing to oblige.

“Thank you, sir, we’ll give you time to prepare,” says Morgan, promising a return that will not occur.

Nah waits until they have returned to the house before she looses a sob.

“Nah! What happened?”

She can’t breathe. She can’t breathe enough to answer the question.

Nah is scared, so scared, so very like the animals in those awful barred caravans. She does not realize that she is safe until she is curled up in Morgan’s arms on the floor.

“Is this about your nightmares, Nah?”

“H-how did you know about those?” She’s kept it to herself, hadn’t she? Hasn’t bothered Morgan with her ridiculous fears…

Morgan cups her face in one hand, clicking her tongue though affection is written clearly in her eyes. “Did you think I wouldn’t notice, Nah? I love you, you know, and I worry about you. Won’t you tell me what’s wrong?”

Nah looks up, into eyes that go between grey and brown so fast she can never tell what they are. She looks up and she sees Morgan, sees her patience, sees her love. She looks up and sees her safety.

 

And so she takes a breath.

 

And begins to speak.

 

And Morgan understands.


	27. Ice - Olivia x Anna

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nothing about Anna would suggest the similarity, but Olivia looks at her and thinks of ice.

Olivia remembers her first home: a mountain village surrounded by nothing but ice and snow. She remembers her mother, the most wonderful dancer, and the way her mother’s dress would glitter like sunlit ice on the mountaintops when she moved. She remembers her father, who carved the most beautiful things out of large frozen blocks and made decorations cherished all throughout the village.

 

Olivia remembers love, and she remembers ice, and she remembers that once she had loved the cold, and the cold had loved her too.

 

Regna Ferox’s capitol is not known for its warmth, but the people supply more than enough of it. Following Basilio’s act of kindness, Olivia rarely experiences anything else. Being one of the West Khan’s favourites has stood her in good staid for the last four years, and that is why she agrees to assist the Ylissean prince and his comrades when Basilio asks if she will take part.

 

To repay the man who took her in from a cold that no longer loved her, Olivia would lay down her life.

 

Luckily, it seems that the Ylissean forces have a tactician who would rather not lose anyone.

 

“Hi, I’m Anna!’ says the redheaded trickster with whom Olivia has been paired. “Robin said your name was Olivia. Is that right?”

“Y-yes,” she stutters out, embarrassed when her face warms up. “I-I hope to be helpful to you i-in some way, Anna.”

One would think that a woman of Olivia's profession would be better at handling herself with other people, but Anna doesn’t seem to mind. “Khan Basilio mentioned your dances being invigorating, and I see you carry a sword. That’ll come in handy.” Olivia is certain that she must look more afraid than she feels, because Anna puts a warm hand on her shoulder and adds, “Just stay close to me, and you’ll be fine.”

They don’t speak much after that, being altogether too focused on taking down the Plegians who keep them from the Mad King—and, though Olivia hadn’t noticed, from the treasures that the Mad King has brought with him to this battle. Anna is good with her hands, and a solid fighter in addition to being able to heal other people, and Olivia would be jealous except that there’s something about the redhead that intrigues her in the best of ways.

 

She doesn’t say anything after the Mad King is fallen by Prince Chrom and a woman with blonde ringlets.

 

She doesn’t say anything even though she and Anna are lauded as the true heroes of the battle.

 

She doesn’t say anything at all, actually, and it is Anna who seeks her out later that night, as the festivities rage on all around them.

 

“You know, you’re very pretty,” Anna says. The words come out too precisely for Olivia to think that the other woman is inebriated. Immediately, she feels a blush begin to rise.

“Th-thanks,” she mumbles, staring at the tankard in her hand and wishing she’d drunk a little more. At least then she could have passed off her embarrassing lack of social skills as drunkenness. “Y-you are t-too.”

She doesn’t know why she responds that way, but she’s not too embarrassed because honestly, Anna is _stunning_. There’s just something about her that Olivia can’t place—something extremely attractive—though she thinks that maybe if she were more comfortable with words, she’d be able to at least describe it. Instead she only smiles sheepishly at the way that Anna grins.

They talk for the rest of the night, and well into the morning, and when Olivia wakes up at half-past noon she does it in Anna’s bed.

 

She isn’t embarrassed.

 

She could always blame it on the victory rush.

 

She decides not to when Anna wakes up and smiles at her.

 

When Anna tells her that she’s thinking of setting up shop in Ferox for a while, Olivia asks if she’s going to need any help, and it becomes clear to both of them that they might have a chance at something special going on. But first, they return to Ylisstol. And more celebrations are had.

Anna, as she learns through long nights spent getting to know each other, is warmer than she’d appear, and Olivia likes that very much. They return to Ferox together, Anna never once complaining about the cold, and though Olivia knows that she is too young and this is too soon, she thinks that she might be falling in love. She still can’t figure out why Anna feels so familiar to her, though—why Anna reminds her of ice and snow and mornings up in the mountains.

 

 

 

A year passes, and Olivia manages to find a healthy balance between spending time at home with Anna and performing. Anna is supportive in a way that’s almost frightening, and when Olivia shares her dreams of opening up her own theatre, Anna approves and begins to save some of her much-beloved gold towards the cause. In turn she assists Anna with whatever she might need; inventory, sales, whatever she can do, and their relationship flourishes.

They’re about halfway towards their second years together when Olivia finally comes up with an answer to a question she has asked herself ever since they first met.

 

Anna is standing behind the counter making a sales pitch for something, and her expression is as lively as ever. Olivia watches her a moment, so in love that she feels a blush coming on even though she hasn’t been noticed yet. Anna’s eyes catch hers and hold her gaze at precisely that moment, and Olivia squeaks in surprise.

It’s the eyes, she realizes. Anna may be warm all over, but her eyes remind Olivia of the way her mother’s dress once glittered like sunlight on the ice. Her eyes remind Olivia of snow and mountains and the way the cold had loved her.

 

Yes, Anna is warm, but her eyes—though they are red—remind Olivia of ice.

They remind Olivia of love.


	28. Float - Cherche x Emmeryn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Emmeryn fell and Emmeryn was found, but with Cherche, Emmeryn...floats.

Emmeryn doesn’t ever really get her memories back.

 

Snippets of things return to her, yes: meeting Robin, saving Maribelle…falling…but she never really gets _everything_ back.

 

She never really remembers what life was like when her mother was alive.

Never really remembers life with only her father around, either.

Never really remembers how deeply she’d cared for her people, nor how much she’d suffered to prove that her love for them all was real and lasting and pure.

 

In some ways, it’s painful, but in others, it isn’t, because Chrom and Lissa are still here still by her side, and they love her just as much as they always have, even if she doesn’t understand why. She knows that it must be difficult for them to see her this way, so she does the best that she can to reassure them that though she cannot remember life before, she can learn to love the life she has now.

 

She isn’t lying, not at all; there is much that Emmeryn loves about this second life she’s been given.

 

For starters, Emmeryn finds that the war has made her strong in ways she simply _knows_ she never was before, and she likes that. Likes the way her body seems to be able to do things that it probably hadn’t been able to do before. How her arms don’t shake when she goes to pick something up that by the standards of others would be considered “heavy” for the old her. How her magic, which hads always—as she’s told—been strong, is now _formidable_.

Yes, Emmeryn is rather happy with the way she’s turned out; pleased that she could become as strong as her siblings have always thought her to be. They tell her that she will always be a hero in their eyes, and she is glad that she is fit to fill such a role.

 

She also, and this she must admit to herself quietly, and with a blush upon her cheeks, is glad that in this second life, she now has time for…love. Because she has a lover, though they are separated by the sea’s distance, and this lover is the one with whom she wishes to spend the rest of her life. The one who has her dreaming about blush-coloured hair and the warmest of charming, mischievous grins.

She remembers riding on the back of a black wyvern, the feeling of the swooping drops akin to falling fast before floating; and thinks that falling in love had felt much like that. Frightening first, exhilarating in the speed of it all, then soft and slow, as gentle as air.

Emmeryn cannot remember if she has been in love before, but she knows that this time, she is in far too deeply to ever get out. Gods, but if only she had stayed in Valm…

 

But no, for now, since the defeat of Grima is so new, she sticks to spending time with her brother, her sister and her niece—there will be time for love later, she reminds herself, as she no longer has the love of the people to strive for and protect. Emmeryn can only hope that her love will wait just a little longer.

She tries to get used to being back in Ylisstol, because though she does not remember the time she spent within the palace walls, her body sometimes seems to, feet constantly taking her towards places she thinks she might have loved before. It is more difficult than any of them could have imagined. Still, she stays. She tries not to miss the woman who’d spoken her name in soft, lilting tones and held a hand to her face on the night before Grima’s defeat became reality. She tries to be contented with this newfound luxury of life, tries to allow some levity into her heart although it feels slow and heavy.

 

The castle doesn’t prove to be something of which she could ever grow fond again, and after Robin is found a field near Southtown she asks if she can leave.

 

Her siblings are, understandably, worried and upset, but they seem to realize that she could never truly be happy here. Sad as it may be, the halls of Castle Ylisstol are no longer her home, and she does not feel the same comfort that she imagines she should feel when she looks about the quarters that “are and always will be” hers. She begins to prepare her things, wondering where she should go.

“Have you given any thought to Rosanne?” Chrom says, though he still tries to convince her to stay with half-hearted entreaties. When she looks at him, wondering why he would so willingly offer to send her to Valm, he only smiles knowingly before _winking_ at her, the cheeky boy—cheeky _man_ , she reminds herself, because her little brother is indeed a man now. “I know that there’s a certain someone you’ve been eager to see.”

“Would you be fine with me so far away?”

Chrom studies her a moment, and Emmeryn gets a flash of that same expression, but on a much younger face; on a much smaller, softer boy. “If I knew that you were happy there, then yes. And I know that she would make you happy, Emm.”

“Thank you, Chrom.”

“Of course, Emm. Now, the next ship heading for Rosanne leaves tomorrow. Shall I secure you a place?”

 

Her goodbyes are sweet and not too sad, as there will be time aplenty for visits.

 

 

 

When the ship arrives on the shores of Rosanne, Cherche is there, waiting for her with a smile that could bring greater women than Emmeryn to their knees.

“Well, well, aren’t you a sight. I have missed you greatly, my darling.”

“I love you, Cherche.”

“And I you.”

 

Emmeryn laughs and throws herself into the woman’s waiting arms.

 

Cherche kisses her sweetly, spins her round, and Emmeryn feels that she is floating even when her feet touch the ground.


	29. Amazon - Say'ri x Flavia

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Say'ri is small and slight, like the women of her country. But that is where the similarities end.

Say’ri is a samurai before she is a princess; a warrior before she is a woman.

She does not mind the differences between her and her fellow women of the court. _They_ may do as they please, may glide about without a care in the royal gardens, or float throughout the castle town with no concerns other than the state of their makeup, or the fall of their clothes.

_She_ , however, has responsibilities.

 

Still, Say’ri is aware of the whispers of the court—the ones saying that she would be prettier if she would dress in the current fashions, or paint her face and lips. They say that as a woman, she is not good enough as she is. She knows that she cannot help that she is more often dressed for sparring than for frivolities. Her time is spent mostly in training, or with her brother when his schedule permits.

 

The whispers continue.

 

She grows her hair longer.

 

The whispers persist.

She dons armour that highlights the femininity of her form, regardless of its impracticality.

 

Say’ri would be lying to say that the whispers do not _bother_ her, but she does these things and tries to ignore them. She says nothing of it to her father. To Yen’fay, she says everything.

Even though the whispers become crueller as she grows into her maturity, she keeps her eyes level with those who mock her, and she does not shy away from their jeers.

 

She hates every. Single. Second of it.

 

She begins to ask Yen’fay to tell her stories of the lands across the sea, of the continent of Ylisse. It becomes a way to escape the whispers. He tells her stories of a land called Regna Ferox, ruled by two Khans; a man and a woman. When she asks what the woman is like, he smiles. “Have you heard the myths of the warrior women of the jungles; the Amazons?

She remembers old stories of warrior women. “Is Khan Flavia an Amazon then?”

Yen’fay shakes his head. “Not as such, but she may as well have been. I have rarely met a fiercer fighter. She’s also a brilliant leader and kind leader, and the sort of woman I believe _you_ will one day become.” Yen’fay stands, adjusting the clasps of his armour before looking kindly down at her. “You may not be the woman that Chon’sin expects, beloved sister, but you need not keep with the narrow beliefs of our society. You need not be ashamed of who you are, Say’ri, and you need not try to change yourself. Only continue to grow, as you have been doing. Like Khan Flavia, I am sure you will one day become a great woman.”

 

 

 

After Walhart invades and Yen’fay defects, she will look back on these days and wish for them—so simple were those trials in comparison to the ones she faces now, on the run from her own homeland and her own people. So sweet were the hours spent in conversation with the brother who has betrayed her.

 

 

 

When she is saved by the Ylisseans, she finds herself mixing with women once more. More than she ever has before. Women of all kinds. Studious women. Noble women. Women who care more about the sharpness of their steel than the contours of their cheeks.

The men, for their part, don’t _care._ They love and laugh and live amongst these women of all types, and they are unbothered. Better than that, they are _proud_ to celebrate such diversity.

For Say’ri, it is such a shocking change that she asks Robin, the tactician—a woman of intelligence and substance, though there is also an air of beauty about her—if things are always this way.

Robin replies that they are, and tells Say’ri, “We look for the beauty of heart in our Shepherds, Say’ri.”

Say’ri finds that she likes that answer, and her efforts towards the cause are only strengthened by the encouragement of the men and women who quickly become her friends.

 

Though they are at war, she does not think that she has ever been so…happy.

 

 

 

And then she meets Khan Flavia after the battle with King Validar.

“You must be Yen’fay’s sister,” says the woman, her statuesque frame making it almost impossible for Say’ri to see past her, small as she is. “Good to finally meet you, Say’ri.”

She bows stiffly to the older woman, embarrassed that she had not approached first. “I am indeed, Khan Flavia.”

Flavia surprises her, taking her chin in one gloved hand and tilting her face towards the light. The older woman’s expression, Say’ri finds, is not intrusive, not hungry, but _searching_. As if the long-awaited answer to a question lies somewhere in her face.

As Say’ri allows herself a second to drink in the beautiful violet of Flavia’s eyes, she catches the way that the khan’s gaze travels over _all_ of her, and she finds it strange that she should not mind this.

When Flavia releases her, she cannot help but ask, “Did you find what you were looking for, Khan Flavia?”

“Please,” says the tall woman, waving her hand at the formality of the address, “Just Flavia. And you know…I hope this isn’t overstepping boundaries or anything, but you’re beautiful.” At Say’ri’s confusion she adds, “Your brother may have mentioned a few…concerns. And I understand that they stem from a cultural opinion, or something, but you’re _beautiful_. You look strong.”

Say’ri is so dazed that she does not answer Flavia until the older woman has backed away a few paces. She is not worthy of such praise, and certainly not from Flavia. “I’m not strong the way you are,” she says. Because try though she might, she will never carry the strength of the mythical Amazons across her shoulders, or up and down the lines of her calves.

Flavia tilts her head in question, smiling. “And who said that you had to be? You’re great as you are, Say’ri.”


	30. Birthday/Velvet - Tharja x Cordelia (Part Five)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And now, just like before, Cordelia loves Tharja.

The day that she and her family move in to their new estate is among the happiest days of Cordelia’s life. There’s just something about the excitement in her children’s eyes as they enter the manor, and the calm, yet quiet approval in Tharja’s, that makes her feel…complete.

Cordelia walks behind her family, smiling at how Tharja takes both of their children by the hand.

Severa pulls her mother and sister along, stopping at the curtains that cascade from the top of the wall to the floor. Tharja takes one look at the fabric and lets go of her daughters’ hands—smiling faintly to herself when they immediately reach for each other—before reaching out to touch the curtains and turning back to Cordelia with surprise on her face.

“Cordelia…”

Severa, never one to want enjoy being left in the dark, puts one of her own hands against the curtains, pulling it back in surprise after she touches the fabric. “Mama, why the curtain feels funny?”

“Funny how, darling?” Cordelia asks, unable to help herself from laughing at the look on her daughter’s face.

Severa shakes her head. “So soft!’

Tharja laughs, the same drawling sound that Cordelia had fallen in love with years ago. The dark-haired woman kneels, kissing Severa’s head. She hugs the twin-tailed girl to her chest when Severa smiles and cuddles in closer, and soon enough Noire is in Tharja’s arms as well, having grown lonely without her sister’s hand to hold. Tharja smooths red hair back from Noire’s face and smiles—actually _smiles_ —before saying, “It’s called velvet, and it’s an expensive material that your mother _shouldn’t_ have splurged on for curtains.”

Cordelia only shrugs when her wife’s pale eyes seek hers from over their children’s heads. They’d spoken before, about Tharja’s fondness for velvet—a memory from Tharja’s life _before_ , with her mother and father—and Cordelia knows that her wife appreciates the gesture. Apparently Tharja decides there’s nothing to be done, and she only smiles before returning her attention to their daughters.

Cordelia smiles at how sweet her wife has become. It’s only ever for a short time, and only with their children, but Tharja is so full of love, and is certainly _not_ the dark-hearted creature that some of the nobility still believe she is. Cordelia loves to watch her wife interacting with the girls—it’s among the sweetest things she thinks she’s ever seen in her life.

Noire looks at her standing mother with curiosity in her eyes. “Vel-vet?”

“Oh, I know what dat is!”

“Yeah, me too!” says Noire after a beat, caught up in her sister’s exuberance.

Tharja laughs again. “Well, what is it then, my little darlings?”

“It’s like the dress!”

“Yeah, da…da purple one!”

“What dress?” Tharja asks.

Severa and Noire look at each other before saying, “Da one Mama bought you!”

Were she a different woman Cordelia might have covered her face with her palm, but as it is, she only smiles. She should have known that her girls wouldn’t be able to keep any secrets. Luckily, she’d had the foresight to carry the dress with her in an unassuming parcel.

She’d rather wait to give her wife this gift, but if she _must_ do it now, then at least she’s prepared.

To her surprise, Tharja only smiles at her and nods to her daughters before asking if they should continue to tour their new home. Met with a resounding “Yeah!” Tharja stands, pausing to lift Noire into her arms along the way. Severa reaches for Cordelia almost instantly, and Cordelia obliges, balancing the girl on her hip as she reaches for her wife. This, she thinks, is what she's always wanted. This love, this life. This is wonderful.

“So…about that dress…?”

Cordelia smiles, leaning over to kiss Tharja’s curious little grin. “I’ll give it to you when the girls are asleep.”

“Is it _not_ a—

Cordelia blushes, catching the way her wife’s grin dips into the utterly _naughty_ , and stammers out a quick, “N-no! It’s an evening gown!”

Tharja’s eyes seem to brighten at the mention of that, as Cordelia had hoped they would. She knows her wife well, after all, and she knows that Tharja would never admit it but she is partial to dressing in gowns from time to time.

 

Later, when Tharja sees the dress for the first time, Cordelia is rewarded with another of her wife’s most beautiful smiles; and then with her wife entirely.

 

The dress appears to be forgotten after it’s initial reveal—due, perhaps, to the season not being one for galas—and even Cordelia does not think much about it until it is the second of April and Tharja is anxiously pacing before their wardrobe. Cordelia herself is seated on the edge of their bed, watching, trying to calm her wife’s nerves.

“Darling, I think—

“I’m sure she meant it well, but I don’t _wish_ to go to the castle tonight.”

“And I know that it is customary to grant the birthday celebrant her wish, but my love, Sumia has organized this night’s ball in celebration. For your birthday, no less!”

“In celebration for _my_ birthday?” Tharja asks, the skepticism plain on her face.

Cordelia cannot hide the sheepish grin that springs to her lips. “Perhaps by my request…but it’s a kind gesture, and we wouldn’t want to disappoint. Besides, it’s Shepherds-only, Tharja. And Severa and Noire…er, _Selena_ and _Noelle_ said that they would be there. And you can finally wear the velvet gown I bought for you…”

Tharja stiffens.

Tharja sighs.

Tharja eventually turns to Cordelia, sauntering over until her hands are on Cordelia’s thighs and she’s all but straddling her wife. “Cordelia?”

“Y-yes?”

“I think I’ll need help getting into my gown.” Cordelia can’t help her eyes from skimming her wife’s body. It’s obvious that Tharja knows how closely Cordelia is watching as the thin silk shift she wears is lifted off her frame. “Well, darling?”

 

Gods, Cordelia loves her.

**Author's Note:**

> KICKING OFF THE NEW YEAR THIS WAY MAY NOT HAVE BEEN MY WISEST IDEA, BUT THAT'S FINE.  
> This has been a _trip_ for me so I hope that this brings a smile to some faces (and I apologize for the sad parts; sometimes they just happen.  
>  Drop me a line [on Tumblr ](https://lazywritergirl.tumblr.com)if you feel so inclined, I'd love to hear from you.


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